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Pax's Battletech Junkyard
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Aurigan Renaissance Prologue Part 1
Imperator Pax
Talon Master
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Original Post Date: 17 May 2023
Colonel Arsacid had appeared on Katinka to put an end to a horrible pirate attack on the world that had killed hundreds of innocent farmers. As a dozen 'mechs ... and their aircraft which had strafed a market ... had battled him across the landscape of the ruin strewn wastes. By the time Grim Sybill's reinforcements had arrived they were too late and the second union dropship full of pirates had faced a much better prepared defense.
Two Companies of BattleMechs were nothing to sneeze at... in the Periphery and a single pilot destroying twenty four mechs before his own reinforcements had arrived would have been a story fit for legend all on its own.
... but then reinforcements had come. Dozens of pristine JumpShips, DropShips, and six full BattleMech Regiments. An unspeakably powerful force compared to each of the Aurigan Coalition's founding Houses ability to deploy singular battalions... and that had been when the offer had been made.
Her father Tamati II of the House of Arano had been offered protection, in exchange for the coalition entering a trade union with the worlds now under the protection of those newly arrived regiments. It could have been a trap, but as her uncle had cynically observed to all present Colonel Arsacid had no need for duplicity his BattleMech Regiments were supported by conventional arms... and it was clear that wherever they had come from they were looking for somewhere to settle... why not recognize their claims and attempt to bring them into the Aurigan fold.
... and so in theory the Aurigan Coalition gained a new House. House Arsacid, though for all intents and purposes Lady Shawkat served as the Colonel's full time advisor to the council. Unfortunately while apparently brilliant in her own right Lady Shawkat was ... well to quote her all but sister her cousin Victoria, BORING... whatever her, Kamea's mother might have thought Kamea had to agree with her cousin.
... though as the future high lady of the Aurigan reach she would one day need to contend with such matters as that of the council she was much more happy to join Victoria in watching the holographic battle footage of Katinka.
--
Lord Tamati was not stupid, but his brother in law had made equally good points. He had hoped to add the independent worlds on their 'eastern' border into the Coalition, and the trade network for years, but it had been a matter of working towards it... and Santiago had been right that there had been delays.
His brother in law was correct that men who commanded whole BattleMech regiments, never mind multiples, did not need to rely on deception. The periphery was an unpleasant and poor place... it would have been all together easy to expect the worst, to expect conquest and subjugation, and exploitation. The Aurigan Coalition's founders had been the descendants of Star League citizens, of SLDF, and Civilian personnel who wanted to maintain civilization even without access to the high technology of Terra and the league, even though the league had fallen by then.
His people had always considered themselves apart of the Star League even in the Rimward Frontier, and they had wanted to make life better. To do more than just survive. It was a lot of work, and the coalition had taken decades of work to establish. Living in the periphery was hard for everyone, but especially the idealists. That hadn't stopped their ancestors from consciously not repeated the same mistakes as had lead to the foundation of the Draconis Combine when they had set up the trade network.
Tamati had studied his family history well.
All of his history, including that the Kintaro he piloted, the Kintaro he would pass on to Kamea had been piloted by an ancestor serving in the SLDF against the Rim World forces. It had been hard to keep the old Kintaro in action... the loss of advanced star league era armor which had been stripped away centuries earlier and replaced with standard battle plate, the need to remove the missile beacon that his computer still occasionally thought should have been there.
... the ability to throw eighteen missiles at an enemy was the kind of surprise that meant the machine stayed relatively intact... from speaking to the ancestral machine's computer he knew what a Nightstar was. The Assault frame Marauder IFF declared it to be a priceless relic even by the standards of priceless relics. It was war machine of a Hegemony Gunslinger. The NighStar's IFF showed man and machine, knight and 'Mech together.
He hadn't needed to watch the shouting match that had devolved from the Combine 'envoy' to recognize a warrior from another era. The envoy had started referring to the Colonel as the Demon King of the Sixth Heaven... for an offense that could not be properly elucidated on only that it had involved some nebulous dishonor to a high ranking member of house Kurita...
... more than two and a half centuries previous.
Had the Colonel and the bulk of the forces with him been caught in some kind of mass misjump? There were always, there had always been stories of JumpDrives having accidents where they'd disappear from the record only to reappear centuries and hundreds of light years distant from where they had last been.
... and if so that meant that this was not some lucky cache find, that these were soldiers who hadn't left with Kerensky. That General Addad was not as a native of Alpha Centauri a citizen of the Lyran Commonwealth, but rather a citizen of the Terran Hegemony. That the same was true of Aisha Shawkat, that she too was from the Terran Hegemony not the Draconis Combine. If that were true there was no telling how many more were, and who would have been born from other member states... who might be from worlds lost in the course of the succession wars...
The Combine's representative though... if one were to be honest were people important enough only to warrant an impressive sounding post, but embarrassing enough that they needed to be posted far from real power so the truth was Tamati knew that their new partners had far more pressing issues than some old samurai... which in hindsight wouldn't be quite as true as Tamati had hoped in thinking the matter might simply blow over... but at the same time.
The Aurigan Reach now had a few more worlds and more importantly the military resources to protect its borders, and that meant it had the attention of its more immediate neighbors. Both the Taurian Concordant and the more distant Canopians, both of whom were now reevaluating their position and foreign policy regarding the Coalition.
--
Jaime Wolf stared at the rotating holographic image. The overlapping DNA strands lined up with a Terran Hegemony Service Number and an image that matched their news footage. An astoundingly good looking man perhaps in his thirties stared coldly back from two distinct frozen images.
One from the 28th century, a man in the field uniform of the Hegemony MechWarrior and the other taken some time earlier this year. They intercepted the latter picture from their tapping of the HPG network from two distinct sources. The First had come from a Draconis Combine transmission, the others from ComStar's news broadcast images the latter talking about dead pirates in the periphery and continued violence being expected... but the Combine had included DNA testing.
DNA testing verified out by their own Science caste... and hence from their own computer archives ... which were themselves unfortunately incomplete... what they had though didn't lie though... or at least verified the Combine's own claims.
A Terran Hegemony Gunslinger seemed to have survived.
--
Note this is the canonical starting point of Aurigan Renaissance it is based off of the combination of Cimbri's Isekai, and the Essence , and while the Aurigan branch of the timeline has take predominance originally there was a more mercenary focused Canopian based branch.
Periphery Warlord: alternate Aurigan Start
Kamea Arano and her cousin Victoria had been quickly captivated by the BattleRoms even without an image of the BattleMech Ace. Colonel Arsacid had appeared on Katinka to put an end to a horrible pirate attack on the world that had killed hundreds of innocent farmers. As a dozen 'mechs ... and their aircraft which had strafed a market ... had battled him across the landscape of the ruin strewn wastes. By the time Grim Sybill's reinforcements had arrived they were too late and the second union dropship full of pirates had faced a much better prepared defense.
Two Companies of BattleMechs were nothing to sneeze at... in the Periphery and a single pilot destroying twenty four mechs before his own reinforcements had arrived would have been a story fit for legend all on its own.
... but then reinforcements had come. Dozens of pristine JumpShips, DropShips, and six full BattleMech Regiments. An unspeakably powerful force compared to each of the Aurigan Coalition's founding Houses ability to deploy singular battalions... and that had been when the offer had been made.
Her father Tamati II of the House of Arano had been offered protection, in exchange for the coalition entering a trade union with the worlds now under the protection of those newly arrived regiments. It could have been a trap, but as her uncle had cynically observed to all present Colonel Arsacid had no need for duplicity his BattleMech Regiments were supported by conventional arms... and it was clear that wherever they had come from they were looking for somewhere to settle... why not recognize their claims and attempt to bring them into the Aurigan fold.
... and so in theory the Aurigan Coalition gained a new House. House Arsacid, though for all intents and purposes Lady Shawkat served as the Colonel's full time advisor to the council. Unfortunately while apparently brilliant in her own right Lady Shawkat was ... well to quote her all but sister her cousin Victoria, BORING... whatever her, Kamea's mother might have thought Kamea had to agree with her cousin.
... though as the future high lady of the Aurigan reach she would one day need to contend with such matters as that of the council she was much more happy to join Victoria in watching the holographic battle footage of Katinka.
--
Lord Tamati was not stupid, but his brother in law had made equally good points. He had hoped to add the independent worlds on their 'eastern' border into the Coalition, and the trade network for years, but it had been a matter of working towards it... and Santiago had been right that there had been delays.
His brother in law was correct that men who commanded whole BattleMech regiments, never mind multiples, did not need to rely on deception. The periphery was an unpleasant and poor place... it would have been all together easy to expect the worst, to expect conquest and subjugation, and exploitation. The Aurigan Coalition's founders had been the descendants of Star League citizens, of SLDF, and Civilian personnel who wanted to maintain civilization even without access to the high technology of Terra and the league, even though the league had fallen by then.
His people had always considered themselves apart of the Star League even in the Rimward Frontier, and they had wanted to make life better. To do more than just survive. It was a lot of work, and the coalition had taken decades of work to establish. Living in the periphery was hard for everyone, but especially the idealists. That hadn't stopped their ancestors from consciously not repeated the same mistakes as had lead to the foundation of the Draconis Combine when they had set up the trade network.
Tamati had studied his family history well.
All of his history, including that the Kintaro he piloted, the Kintaro he would pass on to Kamea had been piloted by an ancestor serving in the SLDF against the Rim World forces. It had been hard to keep the old Kintaro in action... the loss of advanced star league era armor which had been stripped away centuries earlier and replaced with standard battle plate, the need to remove the missile beacon that his computer still occasionally thought should have been there.
... the ability to throw eighteen missiles at an enemy was the kind of surprise that meant the machine stayed relatively intact... from speaking to the ancestral machine's computer he knew what a Nightstar was. The Assault frame Marauder IFF declared it to be a priceless relic even by the standards of priceless relics. It was war machine of a Hegemony Gunslinger. The NighStar's IFF showed man and machine, knight and 'Mech together.
He hadn't needed to watch the shouting match that had devolved from the Combine 'envoy' to recognize a warrior from another era. The envoy had started referring to the Colonel as the Demon King of the Sixth Heaven... for an offense that could not be properly elucidated on only that it had involved some nebulous dishonor to a high ranking member of house Kurita...
... more than two and a half centuries previous.
Had the Colonel and the bulk of the forces with him been caught in some kind of mass misjump? There were always, there had always been stories of JumpDrives having accidents where they'd disappear from the record only to reappear centuries and hundreds of light years distant from where they had last been.
... and if so that meant that this was not some lucky cache find, that these were soldiers who hadn't left with Kerensky. That General Addad was not as a native of Alpha Centauri a citizen of the Lyran Commonwealth, but rather a citizen of the Terran Hegemony. That the same was true of Aisha Shawkat, that she too was from the Terran Hegemony not the Draconis Combine. If that were true there was no telling how many more were, and who would have been born from other member states... who might be from worlds lost in the course of the succession wars...
The Combine's representative though... if one were to be honest were people important enough only to warrant an impressive sounding post, but embarrassing enough that they needed to be posted far from real power so the truth was Tamati knew that their new partners had far more pressing issues than some old samurai... which in hindsight wouldn't be quite as true as Tamati had hoped in thinking the matter might simply blow over... but at the same time.
The Aurigan Reach now had a few more worlds and more importantly the military resources to protect its borders, and that meant it had the attention of its more immediate neighbors. Both the Taurian Concordant and the more distant Canopians, both of whom were now reevaluating their position and foreign policy regarding the Coalition.
--
Jaime Wolf stared at the rotating holographic image. The overlapping DNA strands lined up with a Terran Hegemony Service Number and an image that matched their news footage. An astoundingly good looking man perhaps in his thirties stared coldly back from two distinct frozen images.
One from the 28th century, a man in the field uniform of the Hegemony MechWarrior and the other taken some time earlier this year. They intercepted the latter picture from their tapping of the HPG network from two distinct sources. The First had come from a Draconis Combine transmission, the others from ComStar's news broadcast images the latter talking about dead pirates in the periphery and continued violence being expected... but the Combine had included DNA testing.
DNA testing verified out by their own Science caste... and hence from their own computer archives ... which were themselves unfortunately incomplete... what they had though didn't lie though... or at least verified the Combine's own claims.
A Terran Hegemony Gunslinger seemed to have survived.
--
Note this is the canonical starting point of Aurigan Renaissance it is based off of the combination of Cimbri's Isekai, and the Essence , and while the Aurigan branch of the timeline has take predominance originally there was a more mercenary focused Canopian based branch.
Periphery Warlord, Essence of Megamek lab [Original Canopian Branch Version]
Imperator Pax
Talon Master
- Joined
- Sep 11, 2019
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Original Post Date: 16 May 2023
Periphery Warlord, Essence of Megamek lab [Original Canopian Branch Version]
Heron Arsacid was everything an inner sphere holo vid novel cover noble looked like. Tall, striking in appearance the 'Demon King of Astrokazy' had appeared on the pirate infested world in the Rimward Periphery and earned that nickname by shattering the various pirate bands infesting the planet and the moniker come from the self professed Caliph of the planet before his capital had fallen in a tirade broadcast live.
Jaime had seen the clip of the ranting turbaned pirate king calling the 'Mech Warrior the devil and that he was trying to make himself the demon king of hte world
That clip had after all made its way to planetary media and then off world via ComStar's HPG station, and from there circulated not just to the nearby periphery nation of the Magistracy of Canopus but far and wide across the Inner Sphere, and that was how it had made its way to the attention of the wolf dragoons.
Killing pirates wasn't what attracted anything more than curiosity, but the test results were conclusive... and they weren't the only ones who had established the results. A Draconis Combine report had been intercepted by WOLFNET, through tapping the HPG network using their own HPGs, first commenting on appearance and then a DNA test. A test that they had then validated on their own through their scientist caste personnel.
The DNA was an exact match to a Terran born Gunslinger. The physical resemblance was such that it was impossible to distinguish from a picture hundreds of years old, and one from Astrokazy. So the combine had codenamed him MAOU. A target of extreme priority.
A target of extreme priority but whose appearance was coincidental in the other developments.
--
Astrokazy had not been a fun place to wake up on. It was... akin to the Barbary pirate ports ala the early 18th century a thin veneer of legality and statehood on the frontier of 'civilization' and one that had to be accommodated. It was certainly true that as a lone state with only semi legitimacy the Free Worlds League probably spared professional house troops, or more likely spared the money to hire mercenaries to go in and knock some heads together.
... the problem was with an interstellar scale it might have been counter productive.
Astrokazy had been sort of improving as the caliphs had extended their authority over the planet and the pirate nests. His arrival had changed all of that, not by choice, the reality of interstellar politics had not been his foremost consideration at the time.
To that end he wasn't going to apologize. The nickname would have stuck anyway... he had carved his way through a periphery bandit kingdom and then left it behind, moving first into Marik Space and then back rimward. In part because he wanted no part at all in the tremendous bullshit that was the Marik Civil War entering its waning stages... just as he didn't want the trouble of trying to fix Astrokazy either...
He shifted at the chime giving him the warning to dismiss the screen.
"Colonel Arsacid."
"Lady Centrella." He replied.
Even this was politics. The Magestrix was demonstrating she had no concern for meeting them in space, but there could be no missing that half a dozen 'mech regiments were sitting at the Nadir jump point
... a detail that well had not escaped him. People looked at him as if they were another Wolf Dragoons but the truth was he had other plans than being entangled in the squabbles of the Succession Wars.
So they got down to the question of what they wanted. "I would be more than happy to insure the security of the Magistracy, I don't rightly understand how these Roman cosplaying Lyrans have been allowed to act as long as they have, but truthfully I have no interest in taking them over either... so very much I'd prefer direction on what the Magistracy's political interests in the region are rather than simply doing away with O'reilly without consideration for what comes after... unless you want a mess of infighting, similar to what is happening on Astrokazy."
"No, that's undesirable." But the Magistracy certainly couldn't deny it was always looking for more in the way of military assets... but she still picked up on his hint to move further 'east' so to speak... and there was also, "one other thing colonel," Kyalla Centralla pursed her lips, "If you don't mind my asking, why is it colonel? With the forces at your command, you could be excused for taking a more impressive title... most people in these parts would have, you could easily have carved out your own little fief... but -"
"Because Colonel was the last rank I held." The 'Demon King' replied, "General Addad has ceded overall command to me despite that... but we will eventually look to a more permanent settlement option.
--
He watched the first payment from the Magistracy of Canopus's treasury come inwards. They had pointedly sidestepped ComStar' MRB. He'd... he would make good on the arrangement with the Magistracy and so long as they continued to do so that was fine.
The cash in escrow finished the last digits solidifying.
They had been paid... now they could get to work. With a series of rapid key strokes the elements of the 60th Brigade prepared to accept garrison posts on the Magistracy of Canopus's western border, the combined arms mélange of the unit were star League regulars... of sorts, and it would be the first good look by observers of another great mystery to come out of the Periphery.
The original 60th Brigade had served in the Canopian occupation, the original one of the 26th century, but it had disappeared centuries later, centuries prior to the present during the waning days of the star league. Its combined arms nature and sudden appearance coupled with that of the rest of the formation would attract unwanted attention.
Heron Arsacid himself would attract the attention of the Combine, and its Ronin. Their interest would attract the Wolf Dragoons, who would in turn investigation and report back to the clans. The Taurian Concordant the Capellan Confederation and the Free Worlds League would all look at the latest mercenary hires with concern, as would the smaller Aurigan Coalition and the various free worlds...
... and then there was ComStar.
--
Notes:The following is really what insured that Cimbri's BattleTech Isekai was what I was going to pair Essence with, and this applies to the Aurigan Renaissance version of the timeline, as I said it was entirely too tempting not to use, and having everyone potentially react off of the combine reaction and the abusability of the Essence as well.
Periphery Warlord, Essence of Megamek lab [Original Canopian Branch Version]
Heron Arsacid was everything an inner sphere holo vid novel cover noble looked like. Tall, striking in appearance the 'Demon King of Astrokazy' had appeared on the pirate infested world in the Rimward Periphery and earned that nickname by shattering the various pirate bands infesting the planet and the moniker come from the self professed Caliph of the planet before his capital had fallen in a tirade broadcast live.
Jaime had seen the clip of the ranting turbaned pirate king calling the 'Mech Warrior the devil and that he was trying to make himself the demon king of hte world
That clip had after all made its way to planetary media and then off world via ComStar's HPG station, and from there circulated not just to the nearby periphery nation of the Magistracy of Canopus but far and wide across the Inner Sphere, and that was how it had made its way to the attention of the wolf dragoons.
Killing pirates wasn't what attracted anything more than curiosity, but the test results were conclusive... and they weren't the only ones who had established the results. A Draconis Combine report had been intercepted by WOLFNET, through tapping the HPG network using their own HPGs, first commenting on appearance and then a DNA test. A test that they had then validated on their own through their scientist caste personnel.
The DNA was an exact match to a Terran born Gunslinger. The physical resemblance was such that it was impossible to distinguish from a picture hundreds of years old, and one from Astrokazy. So the combine had codenamed him MAOU. A target of extreme priority.
A target of extreme priority but whose appearance was coincidental in the other developments.
--
Astrokazy had not been a fun place to wake up on. It was... akin to the Barbary pirate ports ala the early 18th century a thin veneer of legality and statehood on the frontier of 'civilization' and one that had to be accommodated. It was certainly true that as a lone state with only semi legitimacy the Free Worlds League probably spared professional house troops, or more likely spared the money to hire mercenaries to go in and knock some heads together.
... the problem was with an interstellar scale it might have been counter productive.
Astrokazy had been sort of improving as the caliphs had extended their authority over the planet and the pirate nests. His arrival had changed all of that, not by choice, the reality of interstellar politics had not been his foremost consideration at the time.
To that end he wasn't going to apologize. The nickname would have stuck anyway... he had carved his way through a periphery bandit kingdom and then left it behind, moving first into Marik Space and then back rimward. In part because he wanted no part at all in the tremendous bullshit that was the Marik Civil War entering its waning stages... just as he didn't want the trouble of trying to fix Astrokazy either...
He shifted at the chime giving him the warning to dismiss the screen.
"Colonel Arsacid."
"Lady Centrella." He replied.
Even this was politics. The Magestrix was demonstrating she had no concern for meeting them in space, but there could be no missing that half a dozen 'mech regiments were sitting at the Nadir jump point
... a detail that well had not escaped him. People looked at him as if they were another Wolf Dragoons but the truth was he had other plans than being entangled in the squabbles of the Succession Wars.
So they got down to the question of what they wanted. "I would be more than happy to insure the security of the Magistracy, I don't rightly understand how these Roman cosplaying Lyrans have been allowed to act as long as they have, but truthfully I have no interest in taking them over either... so very much I'd prefer direction on what the Magistracy's political interests in the region are rather than simply doing away with O'reilly without consideration for what comes after... unless you want a mess of infighting, similar to what is happening on Astrokazy."
"No, that's undesirable." But the Magistracy certainly couldn't deny it was always looking for more in the way of military assets... but she still picked up on his hint to move further 'east' so to speak... and there was also, "one other thing colonel," Kyalla Centralla pursed her lips, "If you don't mind my asking, why is it colonel? With the forces at your command, you could be excused for taking a more impressive title... most people in these parts would have, you could easily have carved out your own little fief... but -"
"Because Colonel was the last rank I held." The 'Demon King' replied, "General Addad has ceded overall command to me despite that... but we will eventually look to a more permanent settlement option.
--
He watched the first payment from the Magistracy of Canopus's treasury come inwards. They had pointedly sidestepped ComStar' MRB. He'd... he would make good on the arrangement with the Magistracy and so long as they continued to do so that was fine.
The cash in escrow finished the last digits solidifying.
They had been paid... now they could get to work. With a series of rapid key strokes the elements of the 60th Brigade prepared to accept garrison posts on the Magistracy of Canopus's western border, the combined arms mélange of the unit were star League regulars... of sorts, and it would be the first good look by observers of another great mystery to come out of the Periphery.
The original 60th Brigade had served in the Canopian occupation, the original one of the 26th century, but it had disappeared centuries later, centuries prior to the present during the waning days of the star league. Its combined arms nature and sudden appearance coupled with that of the rest of the formation would attract unwanted attention.
Heron Arsacid himself would attract the attention of the Combine, and its Ronin. Their interest would attract the Wolf Dragoons, who would in turn investigation and report back to the clans. The Taurian Concordant the Capellan Confederation and the Free Worlds League would all look at the latest mercenary hires with concern, as would the smaller Aurigan Coalition and the various free worlds...
... and then there was ComStar.
--
Notes:The following is really what insured that Cimbri's BattleTech Isekai was what I was going to pair Essence with, and this applies to the Aurigan Renaissance version of the timeline, as I said it was entirely too tempting not to use, and having everyone potentially react off of the combine reaction and the abusability of the Essence as well.
Periphery Warlord Aurigan Branch Part 2 [Combined A&B segments]
Imperator Pax
Talon Master
- Joined
- Sep 11, 2019
- Messages
- 5,905
- Likes received
- 78,890
Periphery Warlord Aurigan Branch Part 2 [Combined A&B segments]
[A battletech Isekai, essence fic]
The planet of Heliat had been added to the Aurigan Coalition early in the 30th century, and for their purposes it was a pleasant agricultural world. Not much for the Aurigans to say about it, and in the 2900s there hadn't much for anyone else to say.
Heron tapped his finger on the armrest as he sat there watching the map. Heliat was the transition point, as things were the 60th Brigade was crossing the frontier in the north to secure Aea. It was a mixed, combined arms, unit, but it was full strength, and it would solidify the Coalition's border with the Concordat. Whether the bulls liked it or not... and indeed that there might be Taurian objections was the reasoning for constructing an entirely new settlement to house a significant Aerospace Force presence to support the 60th.
Aea though was to 'the north', and it was as much to hold the frontier from the bulls as it was to deter any pirate presence or activity. The crossing of Heliat to the 'south', rimward, had another purpose entirely... it was one Heron regretted not being able to go himself, but he had other tasks. For much the same reason he couldn't personally command the regiment going out to hunt down Grim Sybil... and with sealed orders to secure the DropShip Argo.
Katinka was one jump from another world they had laid claim to the world of Artru... and that was his priority. That was his assignment. During 'the war' the Rim World had bombarded Katinka, they had missed the Castle Outpost there, but the planet was still recovering. There were other worlds that could be reached from Artru in time... but they had another priority than just simply laying claim to them... regardless of the lift capacity he could 'spare'.
No from Heliat it was one more jump to Tarragona. Tarragona would be the last world they 'added' to the Coalition this year. If Tamati Arano could convince neighboring systems that they would benefit from the rising star of the Aurigan Reach then that was on him to do so.
Aea, Artru, Qalzi, Regis Roost, Tarragona, Kalzi and Katinka would all receive new planetary governments based on a loose hybridization of the Aurigan model with that of the Terran Hegemony and Federated Suns with military governors in place for temporary security assurance. They were fully intended to be temporary and for a civilian government to take shape as people settled those worlds and new infrastructure was put on.
He knew that had the potential to create internal problems, or at least discomfort. He had the ability to put a battalion of Mechs on each of those worlds on each of those worlds and still have a reserve, but he wasn't intending to suborn the Coalition's loose federal authority. Far from it... he was pretty sure just by being a part of the Coalition Espinosa wouldn't have a real reason to justify any power grabs. The influx of capital resources might well bolster an Aurigan expansion driven by the other founding families... but whatever would happen that would be for later.
No once Tarragona was in hand that would leave them with enough on their plate... and also they still would need to recover the Argo and hunting Grim Sybil gave them cover for that at least. Bellepheron and Alloway were sitting right on the Canopian border, and in the mean time there was another pirate's nest on Fjaldr that needed to be cleared out, but their light horse contingent was preparing for that as things stood.
Katinka would be their primary focus, both as a face world, and because it was largely ideally suited as such. It had mining and agricultural potential in a way that Artru didn't. More than that it was a hub world, Katinka provided a jump point to not just Artru, but to the other four worlds of Regis Roost, Aea, and Kalzi in short it made more practical sense to play Artru off more as a mining world than attempt to relocate there.
No they would emphasize development of Artru's heavy metal resources, and other mining operations, and seek to safeguard the world from visitors. That was part of the reason why he was going in person... why General Addad would hold the fort at Katinka, why Shawkat was on Cormordir.
The Essence flickered into life. It had taken a minute to find. Another one of those things that were absurdly cheap for how valuable such things were. In that respect today was no different than really any other day since he had woken up with this power. Somethings cost very little BV but were very expensive in C-Bills, and sometimes the dollar cost was the opposite.
That was where the shell game esque thing came in... maybe that wasn't the right analogy. He accrued BV daily, but it was slow, but he could also recycle items for their BV or their C Bill value into the essence. That meant he could with enough starting resources rapidly accrue the points necessary by recycling something to get something else, and repeating as necessary.
That also saw to it that he had all the crew necessary to operate the equipment without any issue. It would have been nice if DropShips came fully loaded by default, but they didn't and really that was a small complaint with such a readily exploitable feature as buy something sell it for cash find something with a high bv value and a low c bill cost and then sell them for their bv and repeat as necessary.
Given Fjaldr's status as Hubworld connected to the inner Sphere there was probably going to need to be investment there once the pirates were cleared out. While it allowed jumps to four extant Cappellan worlds it also allowed jumps to five other Aurigan planets. So the pirates needed to be cleaned out and not allowed to reassert themselves, and the border needed to b e watched... but that would have to be after he returned from Artru.
--
There weren't a lot of ComStar operated HPG stations in the Aurigan Reach, in fact of the worlds just added to the Reach Aea was the only one, and brought the reach to four total.
That was saying something since the three Aurigan worlds previously were Coromodir VI the capital of the Aurigan Coalition, Mechdur which had originally belonged to the Capellan Confederation, and finally Panzyr who's HPG had been built by the Star League to reflect Panzyr's use as a vital supply line into the rimward periphery by the SLDF. Mechdur was appropriately placed that signals from any of the other three could go to it. In fact mechdur's HPG network was probably necessary for the Coromodir HPG to really work, though Panzyr did provide a tentative link to presumably HPGs in Capellan space... but that wasn't something most people concerned themselves with.
Instead of publicly concerning themselves with HPGs or ComStar they just allocated a series of Star Lord class JumpShips to play command circuits from Katinka to other worlds in circuit. So far ComStar hadn't said anything, but it was hard to fathom why they had an installation on Aea at all.
... most likely there were another two ComStar HPG stations somewhere further rimward linking Hellespont to Aea and from there to the rest of the network... Artru would have been a good guess... but no there were no signs at Artru... and for that he was glad. Other wise he would have had to do something unpleasant like frame the Taurians for attacking ComStar or something equally underhanded.
They'd probably need to investigate Carthage and Mystras but that was the advantage of Star League Maps from the end of the League. That and Argos would have required a third station in addition to Mystras to link Aea in to Hellespont... but that did hinge on the assumption that Aea was the station linking Hellespont into HPG network... which they couldn't be sure of. Still he doubted his concerns were common in this era... but ComStar was not to be trusted... and it seemed to bear out that their periphery good will missions were mostly puff pieces rather than actual substance, whether that was corruption was harder to bear out but the Orders presence was undesirable. Hence the need to go ahead and plan contingencies to false flag a neighbor... and better the Taurians than sending the Death commando's into a reach HPG station and potentially drawing Capellan attention to the Coalition worlds.
The Dragoons had in canon gotten away with resupplying many times, and here it did seem to be the case that they had made at least one resupply run. So he was banking on at least being able to sustain one resupply, and if he could manage that then in theory figured he had a margin for expansion... just not immediately.
Indeed that option wouldn't be exercised until the Capellan raid on the Taurian world of Brinton caused a catastrophe when they'd tripped over a Rim World bioweapons lab two years in the future... but for now caution and holding the fort with what they had held the day.
Artru was a single jump from Katinka. An easy trip. No, there was no time to be stir crazy for just one jump. No the trip to Artru's real mission was the access to Castle Nautilius, and securing a ground force presence here.
--
While Heron Arsacid departed Katinka with the Artru expedition back on Cormorodir VI Lord Tamati II was beginning to come down off his elation after facing the first major potential hurdle. It was to be expected of course but the rapid expansion of the Reach had drawn attention from their neighbors. The reality of neo feudal politics was seeing how much you could get away with. That was why they absolutely couldn't roll over here. He accepted that, not just because he had hoped to add the worlds in question to the Aurigan Reach in the future anyway.
So there could be no compromising the territorial integrity of the Reach or its new 'March' with the Taurian Concordant... which meant his priority meant keeping talks from turning acrimonious. If Arsacid's force was what he thought it to be then the modern TDF would be charging head long into Star League veterans with fully equipped 'mech regiments... which wouldn't go well for them especially not on prepared defensive terrain.
That there was an entire battalion of Thunderbolt Heavy Mechs deployed as a single unit seemed to support his hypothesis of a jump accident.
Talks though with Zarantha Calderon's representative had ended... at least for the day. What Tamati could not know was that talks would largely stall and Zarantha's death, and succession by her son Thomas would derail them entirely... and in turn Thomas's having to handle the crisis on Brinton would distract him entirely from the matter of his border... and of course other periphery crisis that would shape the later years of the 3rd succession war in the Rimward periphery.
Tamati did hope that he wouldn't have to back away from his assurances that further spinward expansion would be done in a mutual consensual manner... which was ultimately politician speak and one where questions might be raised about what exactly constituted 'spinward' from the Aurigan perspective... was it say spinward of the current border, or would the Taurians intentionally misinterpret it as any expansion spinward of Coromodir.
"We're lucky that the expansion is done." His brother in law remarked sibilantly his aristocratic features narrowed in a half scowl... "And that the Taurians are unlikely to launch any attack on planets that they know have standing mech garrisons. Zaranatha is much to cautious for that,"
... and that it went without saying that the Taurian Conservatives were perpetually fearful of a Davion attack... as if the Federated Suns even cared about the Taurians if only the bulls would leave them alone... no they had to present a strong face to the Taurians to insure they could keep what they held already.
"We can only hope so." He agreed, "I have not pledged a halt to expansion," that would have been too much of a potential concession for the Reach to make, "But practically speaking adding so many worlds regardless of the details put us in a position where consolidation would be preferable for the time being."
There was a vaguely affirmative, if not necessarily agreeing, sound from the Lord of House Espinosa. Rockwellawan had always been just beyond their reach. It was too fair by just a hair to be within a single jump from Coromodir and that had kept it out of the coalition. While less likely to be intransigent over such claims than the bulls, it bore in mind that Rockwellawan had been a former Canopian world... he knew he'd have to keep that in mind when discussing any potential anti-spinward Aurigan efforts.
His brother in law was already thinking about. "While our newest House Lord already has plans to add Tarragona I believe that is his last motion," For whatever reason, perhaps logistical, perhaps not, "That doesn't not prevent us from building off of it."
He could think of the map of space, it didn't help them much. Coromodir required a jump to Guldra then to Helia then to Tarragona... it was true Tarragona was one jump to Portland but it didn't help them much since it was just one more one jump world. "You will not like this but our best solution to expansion would be similar to the one developing spinward." that was to say if they could somehow convince Rockwellan to weld itself to its neighbors and have them all join the Coalition as a block.
That seemed unlikely regardless of recent events spinward.
A man could dream though.
--
Ana Marie Centrella took careful notes... of everything.
Grim Sybill had been a problem since she had arrived in the Rimward reaches from Tortuga. That someone intended to systematically diminish the pirates in the rimward periphery was something the Magistracy could look favorable upon... but that didn't mean the magistracy was planning to simply fawn all over their neighbor's good fortune.
Still the Magistrix and her government was prepared to recognize the Aurigan Reach and its practical real borders immediately if need be. The reason was that her mission was in actuality one of a fact finding mission. Tamati Arano didn't seem to have made any real concessions to gain his benefits... which made her job harder. Had Tamati given something up the Magistracy might have been in a position to make a counter offer.
There was a representative, but the actual House Lord was absent. That was potentially bait, and it wasn't as if she could just board a jumpship and leave coromodir VI to travel further spinward that would have overplayed her hand without a doubt.
So she would have to make do with her diplomatic credentials, and the available persons of note of the Aurigan Capital. Her only link to the man the Combine had called the Demon King was his chief minister, and proxy on the Aurigan Council. Shawkat might have had some military background, but it was doubtful that she had been a career mechwarrior... but whatever the case she was the primary liaison rather than appointing a military officer to the position. That was saying something for someone with 6 pristine battlemech regiments to call on... but the questions was what it said.
The Combine propaganda said one thing.
The fighting on Katinka against Grim Sybil's pirates was another.
The actions didn't seem to be that of a power mad conqueror, but the expansion was quick and too the point... but she supposed that went to the JumpShip fleet that made that possible... which was another matter that the Magistracy needed answers about. In the Taurian concordant's concerns about losing worlds that they had stopped governing a century earlier that Magistracy was more concerned about the broader effects. What were to be the effects of the change down the road? What did the Magistracy stand to gain? What benefits could it secure from relations with the Aurigan Coalition?
These were questions she needed to find the answer for.
--
The original core worlds, or systems really of the Reach had been Itrom, Guldra, Tyrlon, and of course Coromodir. These had been the worlds that formed the trade partnership with Smithon joining for mutual protection. Panzyr, Mechdur along with a handful of minor worlds occurred as part of the expansion in the 30th century.
There was a distinction to be made though, while the Arano had become High Lord, with attendant executive authority the house lords system become more formal and in the interests of mutual defense the house lords became responsible for fielding their own battalions. Arano, Decimis, Karosas, Gallas, Parata, Madeira, and Espinosa provided the armed forces in a largely feudal manner with each house lord as commander in chief of their respective forces.
In theory, Lord Espinosa recognized this insured Coromodir's nominal suzerainty over the other houses. Since it meant that the capital system had two battalions, without considering alliance with the others... and of course this meant Espinosa could support Arano, and vice versa. Likewise Parata of Tyrlon and House Madeira would in turn support them, and of course House Decimis would support House Arano.
This coalition of Coromodir was the noble hegemony that allowed the council lords to largely keep the council on task. If he had to be honest it was the elected representatives who were often the problem, frequently being responsible for dead locking council issues with tittering indecisive arguments that prevented decisive action. It didn't help in his opinion that it was those minor worlds, that were often dependent on their more powerful coalition partners.
Itrom was in many ways in the middle of this, and indeed was one of the worlds in discussion... because it had largely disappeared from star charts of Inner Sphere travelers. House Gallas of Itrom III were always hoping for great council support for regenerative efforts to undo the damage of the 1st succession wars and with new membership was hoping to again levy the council in hopes of getting something done.
Itrom's lack of presence in Inner Sphere star charts though was a point of discussion in itself, given the various worlds included in both their star charts and those of the new 'Aurigan March' spinward... and it was that that Santiago had found himself discussing with his sister Serena. Heliat was all but ideally place to serve as a hub world for future expansion into the four worlds besides Guldra that it could be reached.
Tarragona had already been added in name to the Coalition, and Gangtok had been recently resettled by colonists from Coromodir and Guldra as well. That left Fairuza and Peratadalla as on the map but unclaimed. The latter had been abandoned by the Taurian concordant after a massive industrial disaster had made further extractive operations impractical given the Taurian's declining finances in the 29th century... they could lay claim to it, but they were unlikely to get much of a return. Not immediately. Fairuza might prove more profitable just as a hub as hub world. Further either it or Artru would allow them to jump to Guacin. That world was a better prospect for supporting further expansion rimward. Gaucin was a breadbasket world.
In short they had the potential to expand the Reach, no pun intended.
But such expansion needed to be weighed in the face of other concerns. Mechdur was a hub world and an industrial one on top of that. Eleven of twelve worlds that could be jumped to from Mechdur were coalition worlds, and you could reach Brinton. Mechdur though had not been a Taurian world it had belonged to the Inner Sphere during the hey day of the Star League and he suspected that the planetary ruling oligarchy never forgot that.
Mechdur was the industrial hub, and its security needs were often divided between detachments from House Gallas, Decimis, Karosas and Parata.
House Decimis was unfortunately conservative... it was unlikely they would be all together enthused to support using their world as the center of aggressive expansion. It would be hard Santiago suspected to convince Herotitus, Lyreton or Mandalas into the Coalition easily. They were all too politically fractured at home.
In short, as Serena would go on to summarize as he continued to drum his fingers, "We remain much where we were before."
The Aurigan Reach had expanded yes, but in terms of core ward anti spinward expansion, or of political reforms... they remained unfortunately at loggerheads. Cormodir simply was not placed in the universe where its worlds could lead further expansion by example... not effectively anyway. It was lamentable, and his sister was the only one with whom he could discuss this with, with risking any political capital.
--
The Aurigan March, or as it was to be known the Arsacid Marzban Persian for a margrave, constituted officially Katinka as its hub world, Regis Roost, Qalzi, Aea, Artru, while also laying claim to Tarragona. Gangtok had been one of those worlds that Coromodir and Guldra had been pursuing previous to the events on Katinka and was one of the youngest Aurigan worlds as outside of the March Six.
Nominally speaking that in theory allowed each Mech Regiment to have its own nominal homeworld. Certainly that had been considered, but without the Coalition needing to call upon the regiments they were currently somewhat otherwise arranged. Firstly of course was the detachment hunting the Argo and grim sybil, and secondly the units clearing Fjaldr.
He expected both of those tasks to take through the rest of the year and for the Fjaldr garrison to likely last through potentially even the end of next year in order to prevent any further pirate problems developing. Even so, "The Aurigans are looking for mercenaries?"
"Presently." There was a pause, the holographic image shifted, "Specifically the house lords are looking at retaining a mercenary garrison for Mechdur," Any Taurian invasion of the Coreward Aurigan reach would have to come through Brinton. An attack from New Vandenburg would have to be sent through Aea and that would be very much to the Taurian disadvantage given the garrison there.
... it was possible that A taurian incursion could attack through Girondas but that was such a small settlement and the only world one could jump would be Smithon and potentially Umgard in terms of established Aurigan worlds.
Which did raise the question whether a Taurian invasion was even reasonable to assume. "Is that plausible?"
"The bulls aren't quite as belligerent as we were expecting them to be, but its still apparent they're not happy about the development." It didn't seem as if the sitting Calderon would rush into a military confrontation though.
What what they would likely need to consider were passive aggressive attempts... playground shoving for lack of better comparison... as the Taurians attempted to figure where everything shook out. "We will maintain our present holding pattern." They weren't going to suggest embargoing the Concordat ... but at the same time Heron had no intention of sending any of his ships over the border unless its a military operation.
... and since pretty much everyone that had been generated by the essence were SLDF personnel or their dependents there wasn't exactly a great deal of love lost for the Taurians... but the war was over.. the best everyone could do was to make do with what they had.
What they had was actually quite a lot. The JumpShips and the DropShips could be loaded with goods to sell and that kind of merchant trade would suffice in places that needed things like Water purification or atmospheric scrubbers or other equipment that could no longer be constructed even as Hughes type mobile space stations were maneuvered into orbit around Katinka. They'd to other orbital infrastructure into place of Artru for mining, and those would occupy much of their time.
--
WolfNet's latest intercepts from tapping the HPG transmissions suggested that the Combine had a base in the rimward periphery... but that wasn't the important discovery. Instead it was the growing picture that was being assembled of what was happening in the periphery.
The immediate red flag was that given the demonstrable number of Star Lords any SLDF for lack of a more accurate description colony fleet should have had warships. The Dragoons had been sent into the Inner Sphere with Warships... before of course the Dragoons had realized that warships had gone extinct in the Inner Sphere.
Given the influx of DropShips that had been established as well by the new arrivals.
It was beyond the official scope of hte Dragoons mission, but the Combine's report identified the same Star League pattern jump capable space stations as the Dragoons used. Not really a surprise Hephaestus was after all mostly Star League, it was a standard pattern sub type of the old Hughes Stations that the Star League had used.
The castes responsible for them universally agreed that they had changed very little since the golden century, and thus were mostly 'star league' vintage. The Combine had acquired though, largely dismissed the documents they had acquired as irrelevant to their mission, which laid out planetary governance which followed Hegemony style models of local government. Fundamentally following the same basic principles as established in the early days of colonization under James McKenna and adopted by the Camerons later.
As observed nothing unusual ... certainly nothing to warrant reporting back to the Clan Council as it was in the periphery. With his brother's death... Jaime couldn't spare the resources to investigate at this point, and their mission was to investigate House Marik and the Free World's League not go traipsing about the periphery. It would be what they would call in later years their 'cattle raiding years'... and it would only be in the 3020s in response to a threat that Jaime had never considered appearing that the Dragoons would be able to spare the Widow Company into the periphery... but that was in the future.
Originally posted Part A 16 May Part B: 26 May
[A battletech Isekai, essence fic]
The planet of Heliat had been added to the Aurigan Coalition early in the 30th century, and for their purposes it was a pleasant agricultural world. Not much for the Aurigans to say about it, and in the 2900s there hadn't much for anyone else to say.
Heron tapped his finger on the armrest as he sat there watching the map. Heliat was the transition point, as things were the 60th Brigade was crossing the frontier in the north to secure Aea. It was a mixed, combined arms, unit, but it was full strength, and it would solidify the Coalition's border with the Concordat. Whether the bulls liked it or not... and indeed that there might be Taurian objections was the reasoning for constructing an entirely new settlement to house a significant Aerospace Force presence to support the 60th.
Aea though was to 'the north', and it was as much to hold the frontier from the bulls as it was to deter any pirate presence or activity. The crossing of Heliat to the 'south', rimward, had another purpose entirely... it was one Heron regretted not being able to go himself, but he had other tasks. For much the same reason he couldn't personally command the regiment going out to hunt down Grim Sybil... and with sealed orders to secure the DropShip Argo.
Katinka was one jump from another world they had laid claim to the world of Artru... and that was his priority. That was his assignment. During 'the war' the Rim World had bombarded Katinka, they had missed the Castle Outpost there, but the planet was still recovering. There were other worlds that could be reached from Artru in time... but they had another priority than just simply laying claim to them... regardless of the lift capacity he could 'spare'.
No from Heliat it was one more jump to Tarragona. Tarragona would be the last world they 'added' to the Coalition this year. If Tamati Arano could convince neighboring systems that they would benefit from the rising star of the Aurigan Reach then that was on him to do so.
Aea, Artru, Qalzi, Regis Roost, Tarragona, Kalzi and Katinka would all receive new planetary governments based on a loose hybridization of the Aurigan model with that of the Terran Hegemony and Federated Suns with military governors in place for temporary security assurance. They were fully intended to be temporary and for a civilian government to take shape as people settled those worlds and new infrastructure was put on.
He knew that had the potential to create internal problems, or at least discomfort. He had the ability to put a battalion of Mechs on each of those worlds on each of those worlds and still have a reserve, but he wasn't intending to suborn the Coalition's loose federal authority. Far from it... he was pretty sure just by being a part of the Coalition Espinosa wouldn't have a real reason to justify any power grabs. The influx of capital resources might well bolster an Aurigan expansion driven by the other founding families... but whatever would happen that would be for later.
No once Tarragona was in hand that would leave them with enough on their plate... and also they still would need to recover the Argo and hunting Grim Sybil gave them cover for that at least. Bellepheron and Alloway were sitting right on the Canopian border, and in the mean time there was another pirate's nest on Fjaldr that needed to be cleared out, but their light horse contingent was preparing for that as things stood.
Katinka would be their primary focus, both as a face world, and because it was largely ideally suited as such. It had mining and agricultural potential in a way that Artru didn't. More than that it was a hub world, Katinka provided a jump point to not just Artru, but to the other four worlds of Regis Roost, Aea, and Kalzi in short it made more practical sense to play Artru off more as a mining world than attempt to relocate there.
No they would emphasize development of Artru's heavy metal resources, and other mining operations, and seek to safeguard the world from visitors. That was part of the reason why he was going in person... why General Addad would hold the fort at Katinka, why Shawkat was on Cormordir.
The Essence flickered into life. It had taken a minute to find. Another one of those things that were absurdly cheap for how valuable such things were. In that respect today was no different than really any other day since he had woken up with this power. Somethings cost very little BV but were very expensive in C-Bills, and sometimes the dollar cost was the opposite.
That was where the shell game esque thing came in... maybe that wasn't the right analogy. He accrued BV daily, but it was slow, but he could also recycle items for their BV or their C Bill value into the essence. That meant he could with enough starting resources rapidly accrue the points necessary by recycling something to get something else, and repeating as necessary.
That also saw to it that he had all the crew necessary to operate the equipment without any issue. It would have been nice if DropShips came fully loaded by default, but they didn't and really that was a small complaint with such a readily exploitable feature as buy something sell it for cash find something with a high bv value and a low c bill cost and then sell them for their bv and repeat as necessary.
Given Fjaldr's status as Hubworld connected to the inner Sphere there was probably going to need to be investment there once the pirates were cleared out. While it allowed jumps to four extant Cappellan worlds it also allowed jumps to five other Aurigan planets. So the pirates needed to be cleaned out and not allowed to reassert themselves, and the border needed to b e watched... but that would have to be after he returned from Artru.
--
There weren't a lot of ComStar operated HPG stations in the Aurigan Reach, in fact of the worlds just added to the Reach Aea was the only one, and brought the reach to four total.
That was saying something since the three Aurigan worlds previously were Coromodir VI the capital of the Aurigan Coalition, Mechdur which had originally belonged to the Capellan Confederation, and finally Panzyr who's HPG had been built by the Star League to reflect Panzyr's use as a vital supply line into the rimward periphery by the SLDF. Mechdur was appropriately placed that signals from any of the other three could go to it. In fact mechdur's HPG network was probably necessary for the Coromodir HPG to really work, though Panzyr did provide a tentative link to presumably HPGs in Capellan space... but that wasn't something most people concerned themselves with.
Instead of publicly concerning themselves with HPGs or ComStar they just allocated a series of Star Lord class JumpShips to play command circuits from Katinka to other worlds in circuit. So far ComStar hadn't said anything, but it was hard to fathom why they had an installation on Aea at all.
... most likely there were another two ComStar HPG stations somewhere further rimward linking Hellespont to Aea and from there to the rest of the network... Artru would have been a good guess... but no there were no signs at Artru... and for that he was glad. Other wise he would have had to do something unpleasant like frame the Taurians for attacking ComStar or something equally underhanded.
They'd probably need to investigate Carthage and Mystras but that was the advantage of Star League Maps from the end of the League. That and Argos would have required a third station in addition to Mystras to link Aea in to Hellespont... but that did hinge on the assumption that Aea was the station linking Hellespont into HPG network... which they couldn't be sure of. Still he doubted his concerns were common in this era... but ComStar was not to be trusted... and it seemed to bear out that their periphery good will missions were mostly puff pieces rather than actual substance, whether that was corruption was harder to bear out but the Orders presence was undesirable. Hence the need to go ahead and plan contingencies to false flag a neighbor... and better the Taurians than sending the Death commando's into a reach HPG station and potentially drawing Capellan attention to the Coalition worlds.
The Dragoons had in canon gotten away with resupplying many times, and here it did seem to be the case that they had made at least one resupply run. So he was banking on at least being able to sustain one resupply, and if he could manage that then in theory figured he had a margin for expansion... just not immediately.
Indeed that option wouldn't be exercised until the Capellan raid on the Taurian world of Brinton caused a catastrophe when they'd tripped over a Rim World bioweapons lab two years in the future... but for now caution and holding the fort with what they had held the day.
Artru was a single jump from Katinka. An easy trip. No, there was no time to be stir crazy for just one jump. No the trip to Artru's real mission was the access to Castle Nautilius, and securing a ground force presence here.
--
Aurigan Branch 2 (B)
While Heron Arsacid departed Katinka with the Artru expedition back on Cormorodir VI Lord Tamati II was beginning to come down off his elation after facing the first major potential hurdle. It was to be expected of course but the rapid expansion of the Reach had drawn attention from their neighbors. The reality of neo feudal politics was seeing how much you could get away with. That was why they absolutely couldn't roll over here. He accepted that, not just because he had hoped to add the worlds in question to the Aurigan Reach in the future anyway.
So there could be no compromising the territorial integrity of the Reach or its new 'March' with the Taurian Concordant... which meant his priority meant keeping talks from turning acrimonious. If Arsacid's force was what he thought it to be then the modern TDF would be charging head long into Star League veterans with fully equipped 'mech regiments... which wouldn't go well for them especially not on prepared defensive terrain.
That there was an entire battalion of Thunderbolt Heavy Mechs deployed as a single unit seemed to support his hypothesis of a jump accident.
Talks though with Zarantha Calderon's representative had ended... at least for the day. What Tamati could not know was that talks would largely stall and Zarantha's death, and succession by her son Thomas would derail them entirely... and in turn Thomas's having to handle the crisis on Brinton would distract him entirely from the matter of his border... and of course other periphery crisis that would shape the later years of the 3rd succession war in the Rimward periphery.
Tamati did hope that he wouldn't have to back away from his assurances that further spinward expansion would be done in a mutual consensual manner... which was ultimately politician speak and one where questions might be raised about what exactly constituted 'spinward' from the Aurigan perspective... was it say spinward of the current border, or would the Taurians intentionally misinterpret it as any expansion spinward of Coromodir.
"We're lucky that the expansion is done." His brother in law remarked sibilantly his aristocratic features narrowed in a half scowl... "And that the Taurians are unlikely to launch any attack on planets that they know have standing mech garrisons. Zaranatha is much to cautious for that,"
... and that it went without saying that the Taurian Conservatives were perpetually fearful of a Davion attack... as if the Federated Suns even cared about the Taurians if only the bulls would leave them alone... no they had to present a strong face to the Taurians to insure they could keep what they held already.
"We can only hope so." He agreed, "I have not pledged a halt to expansion," that would have been too much of a potential concession for the Reach to make, "But practically speaking adding so many worlds regardless of the details put us in a position where consolidation would be preferable for the time being."
There was a vaguely affirmative, if not necessarily agreeing, sound from the Lord of House Espinosa. Rockwellawan had always been just beyond their reach. It was too fair by just a hair to be within a single jump from Coromodir and that had kept it out of the coalition. While less likely to be intransigent over such claims than the bulls, it bore in mind that Rockwellawan had been a former Canopian world... he knew he'd have to keep that in mind when discussing any potential anti-spinward Aurigan efforts.
His brother in law was already thinking about. "While our newest House Lord already has plans to add Tarragona I believe that is his last motion," For whatever reason, perhaps logistical, perhaps not, "That doesn't not prevent us from building off of it."
He could think of the map of space, it didn't help them much. Coromodir required a jump to Guldra then to Helia then to Tarragona... it was true Tarragona was one jump to Portland but it didn't help them much since it was just one more one jump world. "You will not like this but our best solution to expansion would be similar to the one developing spinward." that was to say if they could somehow convince Rockwellan to weld itself to its neighbors and have them all join the Coalition as a block.
That seemed unlikely regardless of recent events spinward.
A man could dream though.
--
Ana Marie Centrella took careful notes... of everything.
Grim Sybill had been a problem since she had arrived in the Rimward reaches from Tortuga. That someone intended to systematically diminish the pirates in the rimward periphery was something the Magistracy could look favorable upon... but that didn't mean the magistracy was planning to simply fawn all over their neighbor's good fortune.
Still the Magistrix and her government was prepared to recognize the Aurigan Reach and its practical real borders immediately if need be. The reason was that her mission was in actuality one of a fact finding mission. Tamati Arano didn't seem to have made any real concessions to gain his benefits... which made her job harder. Had Tamati given something up the Magistracy might have been in a position to make a counter offer.
There was a representative, but the actual House Lord was absent. That was potentially bait, and it wasn't as if she could just board a jumpship and leave coromodir VI to travel further spinward that would have overplayed her hand without a doubt.
So she would have to make do with her diplomatic credentials, and the available persons of note of the Aurigan Capital. Her only link to the man the Combine had called the Demon King was his chief minister, and proxy on the Aurigan Council. Shawkat might have had some military background, but it was doubtful that she had been a career mechwarrior... but whatever the case she was the primary liaison rather than appointing a military officer to the position. That was saying something for someone with 6 pristine battlemech regiments to call on... but the questions was what it said.
The Combine propaganda said one thing.
The fighting on Katinka against Grim Sybil's pirates was another.
The actions didn't seem to be that of a power mad conqueror, but the expansion was quick and too the point... but she supposed that went to the JumpShip fleet that made that possible... which was another matter that the Magistracy needed answers about. In the Taurian concordant's concerns about losing worlds that they had stopped governing a century earlier that Magistracy was more concerned about the broader effects. What were to be the effects of the change down the road? What did the Magistracy stand to gain? What benefits could it secure from relations with the Aurigan Coalition?
These were questions she needed to find the answer for.
--
The original core worlds, or systems really of the Reach had been Itrom, Guldra, Tyrlon, and of course Coromodir. These had been the worlds that formed the trade partnership with Smithon joining for mutual protection. Panzyr, Mechdur along with a handful of minor worlds occurred as part of the expansion in the 30th century.
There was a distinction to be made though, while the Arano had become High Lord, with attendant executive authority the house lords system become more formal and in the interests of mutual defense the house lords became responsible for fielding their own battalions. Arano, Decimis, Karosas, Gallas, Parata, Madeira, and Espinosa provided the armed forces in a largely feudal manner with each house lord as commander in chief of their respective forces.
In theory, Lord Espinosa recognized this insured Coromodir's nominal suzerainty over the other houses. Since it meant that the capital system had two battalions, without considering alliance with the others... and of course this meant Espinosa could support Arano, and vice versa. Likewise Parata of Tyrlon and House Madeira would in turn support them, and of course House Decimis would support House Arano.
This coalition of Coromodir was the noble hegemony that allowed the council lords to largely keep the council on task. If he had to be honest it was the elected representatives who were often the problem, frequently being responsible for dead locking council issues with tittering indecisive arguments that prevented decisive action. It didn't help in his opinion that it was those minor worlds, that were often dependent on their more powerful coalition partners.
Itrom was in many ways in the middle of this, and indeed was one of the worlds in discussion... because it had largely disappeared from star charts of Inner Sphere travelers. House Gallas of Itrom III were always hoping for great council support for regenerative efforts to undo the damage of the 1st succession wars and with new membership was hoping to again levy the council in hopes of getting something done.
Itrom's lack of presence in Inner Sphere star charts though was a point of discussion in itself, given the various worlds included in both their star charts and those of the new 'Aurigan March' spinward... and it was that that Santiago had found himself discussing with his sister Serena. Heliat was all but ideally place to serve as a hub world for future expansion into the four worlds besides Guldra that it could be reached.
Tarragona had already been added in name to the Coalition, and Gangtok had been recently resettled by colonists from Coromodir and Guldra as well. That left Fairuza and Peratadalla as on the map but unclaimed. The latter had been abandoned by the Taurian concordant after a massive industrial disaster had made further extractive operations impractical given the Taurian's declining finances in the 29th century... they could lay claim to it, but they were unlikely to get much of a return. Not immediately. Fairuza might prove more profitable just as a hub as hub world. Further either it or Artru would allow them to jump to Guacin. That world was a better prospect for supporting further expansion rimward. Gaucin was a breadbasket world.
In short they had the potential to expand the Reach, no pun intended.
But such expansion needed to be weighed in the face of other concerns. Mechdur was a hub world and an industrial one on top of that. Eleven of twelve worlds that could be jumped to from Mechdur were coalition worlds, and you could reach Brinton. Mechdur though had not been a Taurian world it had belonged to the Inner Sphere during the hey day of the Star League and he suspected that the planetary ruling oligarchy never forgot that.
Mechdur was the industrial hub, and its security needs were often divided between detachments from House Gallas, Decimis, Karosas and Parata.
House Decimis was unfortunately conservative... it was unlikely they would be all together enthused to support using their world as the center of aggressive expansion. It would be hard Santiago suspected to convince Herotitus, Lyreton or Mandalas into the Coalition easily. They were all too politically fractured at home.
In short, as Serena would go on to summarize as he continued to drum his fingers, "We remain much where we were before."
The Aurigan Reach had expanded yes, but in terms of core ward anti spinward expansion, or of political reforms... they remained unfortunately at loggerheads. Cormodir simply was not placed in the universe where its worlds could lead further expansion by example... not effectively anyway. It was lamentable, and his sister was the only one with whom he could discuss this with, with risking any political capital.
--
The Aurigan March, or as it was to be known the Arsacid Marzban Persian for a margrave, constituted officially Katinka as its hub world, Regis Roost, Qalzi, Aea, Artru, while also laying claim to Tarragona. Gangtok had been one of those worlds that Coromodir and Guldra had been pursuing previous to the events on Katinka and was one of the youngest Aurigan worlds as outside of the March Six.
Nominally speaking that in theory allowed each Mech Regiment to have its own nominal homeworld. Certainly that had been considered, but without the Coalition needing to call upon the regiments they were currently somewhat otherwise arranged. Firstly of course was the detachment hunting the Argo and grim sybil, and secondly the units clearing Fjaldr.
He expected both of those tasks to take through the rest of the year and for the Fjaldr garrison to likely last through potentially even the end of next year in order to prevent any further pirate problems developing. Even so, "The Aurigans are looking for mercenaries?"
"Presently." There was a pause, the holographic image shifted, "Specifically the house lords are looking at retaining a mercenary garrison for Mechdur," Any Taurian invasion of the Coreward Aurigan reach would have to come through Brinton. An attack from New Vandenburg would have to be sent through Aea and that would be very much to the Taurian disadvantage given the garrison there.
... it was possible that A taurian incursion could attack through Girondas but that was such a small settlement and the only world one could jump would be Smithon and potentially Umgard in terms of established Aurigan worlds.
Which did raise the question whether a Taurian invasion was even reasonable to assume. "Is that plausible?"
"The bulls aren't quite as belligerent as we were expecting them to be, but its still apparent they're not happy about the development." It didn't seem as if the sitting Calderon would rush into a military confrontation though.
What what they would likely need to consider were passive aggressive attempts... playground shoving for lack of better comparison... as the Taurians attempted to figure where everything shook out. "We will maintain our present holding pattern." They weren't going to suggest embargoing the Concordat ... but at the same time Heron had no intention of sending any of his ships over the border unless its a military operation.
... and since pretty much everyone that had been generated by the essence were SLDF personnel or their dependents there wasn't exactly a great deal of love lost for the Taurians... but the war was over.. the best everyone could do was to make do with what they had.
What they had was actually quite a lot. The JumpShips and the DropShips could be loaded with goods to sell and that kind of merchant trade would suffice in places that needed things like Water purification or atmospheric scrubbers or other equipment that could no longer be constructed even as Hughes type mobile space stations were maneuvered into orbit around Katinka. They'd to other orbital infrastructure into place of Artru for mining, and those would occupy much of their time.
--
WolfNet's latest intercepts from tapping the HPG transmissions suggested that the Combine had a base in the rimward periphery... but that wasn't the important discovery. Instead it was the growing picture that was being assembled of what was happening in the periphery.
The immediate red flag was that given the demonstrable number of Star Lords any SLDF for lack of a more accurate description colony fleet should have had warships. The Dragoons had been sent into the Inner Sphere with Warships... before of course the Dragoons had realized that warships had gone extinct in the Inner Sphere.
Given the influx of DropShips that had been established as well by the new arrivals.
It was beyond the official scope of hte Dragoons mission, but the Combine's report identified the same Star League pattern jump capable space stations as the Dragoons used. Not really a surprise Hephaestus was after all mostly Star League, it was a standard pattern sub type of the old Hughes Stations that the Star League had used.
The castes responsible for them universally agreed that they had changed very little since the golden century, and thus were mostly 'star league' vintage. The Combine had acquired though, largely dismissed the documents they had acquired as irrelevant to their mission, which laid out planetary governance which followed Hegemony style models of local government. Fundamentally following the same basic principles as established in the early days of colonization under James McKenna and adopted by the Camerons later.
As observed nothing unusual ... certainly nothing to warrant reporting back to the Clan Council as it was in the periphery. With his brother's death... Jaime couldn't spare the resources to investigate at this point, and their mission was to investigate House Marik and the Free World's League not go traipsing about the periphery. It would be what they would call in later years their 'cattle raiding years'... and it would only be in the 3020s in response to a threat that Jaime had never considered appearing that the Dragoons would be able to spare the Widow Company into the periphery... but that was in the future.
Originally posted Part A 16 May Part B: 26 May
Rabid Fox 1&2 Mallory's World Introduction
Imperator Pax
Talon Master
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A Rabid Fox appears from the Heavens!
Mallory's world, 3013
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 how's it going' by running right into it 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.Part 2
... 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.
--
Thankfully I posted a lot of stuff in one section so this is taken from the extras threadmarks of my Ghost Who Walks thread
Rabid Fox ... [Part 3] Mallory's World Part 3
Imperator Pax
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Originally Posted 28 April
Sitting inside the cockpit his hand hovered over the display... holy shit this was an isekai... not just oh you've been reincarnated they were full blown overpowered protag kun ttrpg options... that were just sitting their outside of his reach. His hand continued to shake as his stats screen popped up.
He needed BV though.
Five hundred BV equaled Five Hundred XP
He could get Phantom Mech Warrior... he needed to get Phantom MechWarrior
.... but also Fast Learner... skills cost less... he needed that too.
The hand trembled.
Right now he was sitting inside his Rabid Fox, which was parked in the current square formation of the fourth Davion Guards... who had rather awkwardly conglomerated themselves around so there would be no repeat of what history here would recall as Yorinaga Kurita's death ride. For now though such things were beyond the scope of present thought, Yorinaga might have gone to his death, but he had still lead a battalion of elite combine mechwarriors in an attempt to head hunt the First Prince of the Federated Suns... and he would have gotten away with it too.
... the Fed Suns weren't about to let that happen for a second time.
There were some grumbling, and some worrying that they might be ceding too much of the initiative... but the security of the head of state took priority they couldn't afford to lose Ian Davion to the Combine and so the Fourth Davion Guards had closed ranks. Part of that was obviously that it was getting dark, and night fighting was a dangerous prospect, they weren't taking any chances.
He leaned back and his head hit the back rest of the cockpit.
"MechWarrior are you awake?"
... he blew out a breath and sat back up, holding the transmit button, "Unfortunately." He really hated the teenage body he had. He sounded especially sullen and petulant at the situation. He scratched the back of his head... fuck a shower would have been nice rather than just sponging off in the cockpit. The CO of Badanoff's Brigads was a Masha Badanoff, and they were serving as the command and control element for what seemed like the Lancers... maybe even the entire Davion force. Ron Kane-Logan... got to love those hyphened names was the 7th Crucis Lancer's Regimental CO and it was his force, in association with the Militia units that were the primary screen... and from the sound of it the Lancers were as befitted the advance line now in contact with combine probing forces.
The fusion engine came back up to full power, and he eased it forward.
He wondered if anyone was paying attention was my seventy tonner moved at Charger esque speeds. The 15 ton 350 extra light pushing the heavy mech up to eighty six kilometers and hour. On the other hand it was just as likely this was a case of of respond with anything available... and in this case it meant mercenaries. He didn't care right now... he hadn't been able to sleep anyway. The shakes had passed, he'd gotten food, and he was too ... there was too much sensory input... too much new things to let him sleep. So yeah, next fight.
--
Mechs burned, vehicles burned, men burned.
Shrubs too. Everything was on fire.
That was the thing when your extended range large lasers outranged everything else on the battlefield. He stood there and watched as his machine's targeting computer panned the area. There was something to be said for stand off long range engagement, even more so when he was shooting an enemy that couldn't' effectively shoot back.
... but it was taking its tool. He suppressed a yawn, a reflexive indicator that the fatigue was getting to him... and dawn was only just now peeking at the horizon.
When he had been looking at his gamer esque character sheet, he'd pegged his skills as that of an experienced mechwarrior and also technician... the latter was a nice boon... of course he figured that regardless of what his base gunnery was the targeting computer was doing most of the heavy lifting... especially with a direct weapon like the lasers. Still it was what ATOW would have called a four and 4/4 in table top... not amazing but he knew how to drive the mech.
All that being said, he figured running into Yorinaga had been a lucky break... maybe he'd given that guy a concussion maybe just some bad whiplash from hitting the Warhammer with a seventy tonner going flat out at fifty plus miles an hour was all kinds of kinetic energy... the subsequent punching with armored gauntlets until the Inner Sphere mech had just broken had never let Yorinaga get a shot off, but even if he had would it have been enough?
The Combine Warhammer had been specced for long range dueling not having a seventy tonner in touching distance... well they'd never know would they? All he knew was compared to shooting sword of light mechs and being shot at in turn was a lot more hair raising than shooting at Dieron's regulars with their light mechs.
Not that he was complaining he'd much happily keep shooting at the 36th than fight something closer to a fair fight of mechs in his own weight class from the 'Head taking' 24th Dieron Regulars... especially since those assholes actually were willing to use combined arms. They could continue to be the Kell Hounds problem... thank you very much.
He stretched , and suppressed a groan as his back popped. He'd been in this chair too long, harnessed in too long. He'd never been an energy drink guy. To be fair he'd probably had drank too much soda, too much coffee, and too much tea to give those people any sort of grief without being a massive hypocrite for doing so but there was a point where the body just wasn't able to hold up. Where he was going to start slipping without it... and unlike with a vehicle, or a foot patrol there was no one to drive and hold watch since mechs were typically single seaters.
He was going to have to rotate off the line, and get some sleep. He was going to have to make himself eat even though what he was doing wasn't burning a whole lot of calories in the way humping a ruck would. This was a different sort of war, and it had different rules. This invasion, and this scorched earth campaign the combine were fighting might have been normal for those assholes, but they weren't normal for him, or for the Fed Suns.
This was the kind of behavior that wasn't supposed to happen any more. There were supposed to be rules. There were supposed to be gentlemanly agreements. The Ares Convention may not have been legally binding but it was still supposed to be, expected to be upheld in spirit.
... not that he had a particular reason to care a whit about the Ares Convention by name... but that was another matter.
--
Ian Davion took his responsibilities as First Prince very seriously. It was after all the role he had been groomed for since birth. That and it was hard to sleep with a broken nose from where his face had inadvertently been introduced to one of the large consoles of his Atlas due to a lucky blow from a combine mech towards the end of the previous day... so he had gotten up dressed and prepared for the day ahead of him.
The 7th Crucis Lancers had truly worked hard to restore their reputation and prove that he'd been right to give them the honor to participate in this operation. They were Heroes of the Federated Suns. The Kell Hounds down to even their new recruits likewise were warriors par excellence. The combine's invasion, the sword had been shattered as it were.
He appreciated the good intentions behind his subject's fussing over his well being, but he was eager to return to the fight, rejoin the fray and drive these invading scoundrels from his domain. He had a good fight in front of him, and that was infinitely preferable to having to deal with the politics that infested the halls of New Avalon.
As the sun rose over Mallory's world on the 22nd of October 3013 Ian looked at his staff, and nodded, signaling them to begin the process of preparing for today's actions against the Federated Suns' eternal enemy. To that end he did not view the risk of near death in battle against a numerically superior foreign horde as anything other than the due risks of a prince protecting his people... but he hadn't died... now the Combine was on the back foot, and they would show them what was what.
After all once they were done here they could punch back. They could attack Halstead station.
--
Notes: Okay I believe I am almost caught up on crossposting these from the general thread, tomorrow I will probably post new content to the Rabid Fox thread itself.
Rabid Fox ... [Part 3]
Mallory's World Part 3
The obnoxious congratulations made his eye twitch. He'd noticed the gamer display earlier popping up and the similarities of ATOW but as darkness had fallen, and midnight approached he really saw it.Mallory's World Part 3
Sitting inside the cockpit his hand hovered over the display... holy shit this was an isekai... not just oh you've been reincarnated they were full blown overpowered protag kun ttrpg options... that were just sitting their outside of his reach. His hand continued to shake as his stats screen popped up.
He needed BV though.
Five hundred BV equaled Five Hundred XP
He could get Phantom Mech Warrior... he needed to get Phantom MechWarrior
.... but also Fast Learner... skills cost less... he needed that too.
The hand trembled.
Right now he was sitting inside his Rabid Fox, which was parked in the current square formation of the fourth Davion Guards... who had rather awkwardly conglomerated themselves around so there would be no repeat of what history here would recall as Yorinaga Kurita's death ride. For now though such things were beyond the scope of present thought, Yorinaga might have gone to his death, but he had still lead a battalion of elite combine mechwarriors in an attempt to head hunt the First Prince of the Federated Suns... and he would have gotten away with it too.
... the Fed Suns weren't about to let that happen for a second time.
There were some grumbling, and some worrying that they might be ceding too much of the initiative... but the security of the head of state took priority they couldn't afford to lose Ian Davion to the Combine and so the Fourth Davion Guards had closed ranks. Part of that was obviously that it was getting dark, and night fighting was a dangerous prospect, they weren't taking any chances.
He leaned back and his head hit the back rest of the cockpit.
"MechWarrior are you awake?"
... he blew out a breath and sat back up, holding the transmit button, "Unfortunately." He really hated the teenage body he had. He sounded especially sullen and petulant at the situation. He scratched the back of his head... fuck a shower would have been nice rather than just sponging off in the cockpit. The CO of Badanoff's Brigads was a Masha Badanoff, and they were serving as the command and control element for what seemed like the Lancers... maybe even the entire Davion force. Ron Kane-Logan... got to love those hyphened names was the 7th Crucis Lancer's Regimental CO and it was his force, in association with the Militia units that were the primary screen... and from the sound of it the Lancers were as befitted the advance line now in contact with combine probing forces.
The fusion engine came back up to full power, and he eased it forward.
He wondered if anyone was paying attention was my seventy tonner moved at Charger esque speeds. The 15 ton 350 extra light pushing the heavy mech up to eighty six kilometers and hour. On the other hand it was just as likely this was a case of of respond with anything available... and in this case it meant mercenaries. He didn't care right now... he hadn't been able to sleep anyway. The shakes had passed, he'd gotten food, and he was too ... there was too much sensory input... too much new things to let him sleep. So yeah, next fight.
--
Mechs burned, vehicles burned, men burned.
Shrubs too. Everything was on fire.
That was the thing when your extended range large lasers outranged everything else on the battlefield. He stood there and watched as his machine's targeting computer panned the area. There was something to be said for stand off long range engagement, even more so when he was shooting an enemy that couldn't' effectively shoot back.
... but it was taking its tool. He suppressed a yawn, a reflexive indicator that the fatigue was getting to him... and dawn was only just now peeking at the horizon.
When he had been looking at his gamer esque character sheet, he'd pegged his skills as that of an experienced mechwarrior and also technician... the latter was a nice boon... of course he figured that regardless of what his base gunnery was the targeting computer was doing most of the heavy lifting... especially with a direct weapon like the lasers. Still it was what ATOW would have called a four and 4/4 in table top... not amazing but he knew how to drive the mech.
All that being said, he figured running into Yorinaga had been a lucky break... maybe he'd given that guy a concussion maybe just some bad whiplash from hitting the Warhammer with a seventy tonner going flat out at fifty plus miles an hour was all kinds of kinetic energy... the subsequent punching with armored gauntlets until the Inner Sphere mech had just broken had never let Yorinaga get a shot off, but even if he had would it have been enough?
The Combine Warhammer had been specced for long range dueling not having a seventy tonner in touching distance... well they'd never know would they? All he knew was compared to shooting sword of light mechs and being shot at in turn was a lot more hair raising than shooting at Dieron's regulars with their light mechs.
Not that he was complaining he'd much happily keep shooting at the 36th than fight something closer to a fair fight of mechs in his own weight class from the 'Head taking' 24th Dieron Regulars... especially since those assholes actually were willing to use combined arms. They could continue to be the Kell Hounds problem... thank you very much.
He stretched , and suppressed a groan as his back popped. He'd been in this chair too long, harnessed in too long. He'd never been an energy drink guy. To be fair he'd probably had drank too much soda, too much coffee, and too much tea to give those people any sort of grief without being a massive hypocrite for doing so but there was a point where the body just wasn't able to hold up. Where he was going to start slipping without it... and unlike with a vehicle, or a foot patrol there was no one to drive and hold watch since mechs were typically single seaters.
He was going to have to rotate off the line, and get some sleep. He was going to have to make himself eat even though what he was doing wasn't burning a whole lot of calories in the way humping a ruck would. This was a different sort of war, and it had different rules. This invasion, and this scorched earth campaign the combine were fighting might have been normal for those assholes, but they weren't normal for him, or for the Fed Suns.
This was the kind of behavior that wasn't supposed to happen any more. There were supposed to be rules. There were supposed to be gentlemanly agreements. The Ares Convention may not have been legally binding but it was still supposed to be, expected to be upheld in spirit.
... not that he had a particular reason to care a whit about the Ares Convention by name... but that was another matter.
--
Ian Davion took his responsibilities as First Prince very seriously. It was after all the role he had been groomed for since birth. That and it was hard to sleep with a broken nose from where his face had inadvertently been introduced to one of the large consoles of his Atlas due to a lucky blow from a combine mech towards the end of the previous day... so he had gotten up dressed and prepared for the day ahead of him.
The 7th Crucis Lancers had truly worked hard to restore their reputation and prove that he'd been right to give them the honor to participate in this operation. They were Heroes of the Federated Suns. The Kell Hounds down to even their new recruits likewise were warriors par excellence. The combine's invasion, the sword had been shattered as it were.
He appreciated the good intentions behind his subject's fussing over his well being, but he was eager to return to the fight, rejoin the fray and drive these invading scoundrels from his domain. He had a good fight in front of him, and that was infinitely preferable to having to deal with the politics that infested the halls of New Avalon.
As the sun rose over Mallory's world on the 22nd of October 3013 Ian looked at his staff, and nodded, signaling them to begin the process of preparing for today's actions against the Federated Suns' eternal enemy. To that end he did not view the risk of near death in battle against a numerically superior foreign horde as anything other than the due risks of a prince protecting his people... but he hadn't died... now the Combine was on the back foot, and they would show them what was what.
After all once they were done here they could punch back. They could attack Halstead station.
--
Notes: Okay I believe I am almost caught up on crossposting these from the general thread, tomorrow I will probably post new content to the Rabid Fox thread itself.
Rabid Fox Scrap Mallory's World Part 4
Imperator Pax
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Rabid Fox Scrap
Mallory's World Part 4
Mallory's World Part 4
They were officially on down time. Not the unfun safety stand down kind... thankfully. Now the 4th Davion Guards had swung in with the Kell Hounds, and ... well not that anyone was calling it that, but executed a double envelopment against the Combine's now pocketted forces... the question had really turned into a lingering wonder of what was going to happen next. After having lost the momentum, after having lost central leadership by having Yorinaga hay off with his staff, and then get himself killed and his battalion wiped out the forward most thrust of Combine invasion had been stalled and then enveloped and torn to pieces.
Maybe the combine had already over extended itself, maybe they hadn't been properly supplied in the first place, but whatever the case the turn around had been fairly rapid once it had become clear Yorinaga Kurita was dead, and his battalion wiped out... combine cohesion if not morale seemed to dissolve. Rather than go in, and force desperate pockets of resistance, Davion infantry and armor from the DMM units called to repel the invasion of Mallory's world simply let them stew in cauldrons. The combine units wouldn't surrender, but they couldn't force a break out.
There for it seemed like the battle of Mallory's world, what would be remembered as the 3rd Battle of Mallory's World would be remembered as a great decisive victory for the Federated Suns. A dramatic turn in the third succession war that could be ascribed to Davion virtues, as well as the gross over extension of the Combine's lines of supply and ability to project forces.
... and it would set the stage for the invasion of Halstead station to prevent the Combine from establishing a major supply base to allow it to actually support the DCMS's efforts to try again later on. They weren't there yet... there were still actively resisting Combine troops engaged on Mallroy's world, but for right now the Federated Suns aligned forces were being told to sit tight and effect whatever leisure they could as paper work and so forth was conducted.
... but for the moment the Davions had rows of field tables set up, the fugly folding ones that had clearly looked liked they had seen better days probably when they'd been new, or that they belonged in a second hand office goods store and certainly shouldn't have been used to rest expensive electronics on to handle all that. It was that mix of crappy tables, pens and paper, and high tech holographic computer projectors that made it all come together. That and the crowd of people all around... there were combat arms, and camp followers, both supporters from offworld, and local civilians who were hanging around to eke out a living.
It was as a result loud, crowded, and charitably a chaotic disorganized mess with people wearing all sorts of different clothes, and a mix of languages. It was true at least in the latter case that English was by far the most common, but between different accents and various slang... that didn't' help all that much. There was also no separation, no fences separated the troops from the civilian population, which made a mess of things and there were entirely too few MPs around... but then again he supposed that he like a lot of the people here were mercenaries not ordinary soldiers.
The sprawl of tents, and almost overnight shanty town also meant there were few real amenities... no surprise given the damage the Dracs had willfully inflicted in the course of their invasion. He made a point of not thinking too hard about the realities of that.
He flipped the data chit of his gun footage, a compilation of every mech that he had shot, plus the shaky cam footage of punching a warhammer until it broke. He had not included either his running his seventy tonner into it from behind, or his subsequent stepping all over the other heavy mech as he'd shot at Yorinaga's battalion mates.
He glanced up after a minute after the clacking of the keys had stopped. Then he went back to fidgeting with his pen in boredom... he wondered if the davions were consolidating the mercenaries in reserve to make the final push look like an all Davion effort for the holovids... or maybe he was just being cynical. There was a pause in the clacking of hte key board and the person on the other side of the table who could have been any generic white collar office drone anywhere stopped to make a phone call, and then seemed to get put on hold, and had to wait, so he had to wait.
--
The Davions were not going to let him keep Yorinaga's warhammer.
That was apparently something that ordinarily would have been a big deal. Yorinaga Kurita didn't have any kind of bounty on his head for killing... which admittedly was kind of disappointing but the Davions wanted the mech presumably for their own propaganda value, or bragging rights or whatever. Unlike with other salvage claims taking a member, even a cadet member, of House Kurita and a sword of light officer's mech was too good an opportunity for them to pass up... but royal largesse meant that unlike other salvage claims they were willing to pay for it.
The offer for Yorinaga was either the monetary value of a factory new Warhammer, or actually to provide him a factory new Warhammer. That would have meant waiting for the Federated Suns production line to have a 6D roll off the factory floor. No telling when that would be. He'd take the money thanks if he couldn't have Yorinaga's machine.
... what of course he hadn't told them was that he had planned to just recycle any components that he salvaged... because well that would mean magic needing to be explained. That was where problem number two came in instead of getting dibs on every mech that he'd shot to pieces, mechs being ungodly expensive and important and so on and on so forth there was a bounty for those. House Davion didn't pay all that much for each downed mech, so that was kind of a disappointment in itself, but the share system for kills in action in theory tallied up to he could take some of the salvage relative to a portion of the mechs he had left as smoking ruins.
It wasn't fair, per se, but it was business he didn't really expect fair. It was probably a better deal... hell it was certainly a better deal than what he would have gotten fighting for the Combine so there was no point in complaining.
No what really took the most time was the number of mechs he'd sealed the deal on. A company sized element out shooting a battalion of Sword of Light was up there, never mind the other machines after and with November right around the corner the fighting nearing its end there were a lot of combine wrecks sitting there.
He half suspected that the Davion representative was banking on that a single mechwarrior with no company support would have to turn back to the davions to buy the salvage off... and probably for a pittance of what it was worth. Well, that might have possible been true in normal situations, he'd begged off for time to see about somethings and after an afternoon talking to an MRB paper pusher come back the following morning with a plan...
It was also of course the same morning that the davions had come forward with their own planned proposal. There was still fighting to be done of course, but they were looking for people to sign on, to make two jumps over the border into Combine Space, and hit Halstead Station. There was a lot of hurrah hurrah jingoism thrown in with the pitch, and he tentatively expressed interest, but said he needed some time... to the palpable disappointment, and probable annoyance of the Davion official he'd been dealing with...
He expected that would be worse when he showed up this afternoon, when he made the Davion's a counter offer. The Star Lord class JumpShip had entered service in 2590, it massed 274k tons and should have retailed 750M in theoretical c bills. Why theoretical? People didn't just sell JumpShips anymore.
The venerable old JumpShip deign because all jumpship designs were venerable were the kind of things whose production had all but dried up. The Star Lord class in particular was particularly valuable because it had a DropShip Capacity of Six. That 750 Million C Bills put it well outside of the kind of cash even the price of pristine salvage never mind what the Davions were offering... but a Star Lord for whatever arcane sense it made only had a BattleValue of 604.
A fucking Union was more expensive... dropships were horribly expensive by comparison because they actually mounted the firepower to fight stuff. By comparison a priceless JumpShip like the Star Lord was the save BV roughly as a Commando. Rather than spend his painfully limited volume of BV on a union he settled for the JumpShip carrying a pair of Mules. Not perfect, not really ideal but it was something... he had limited resources. As tempting as a Clan Behemoth at about the same price, per mule, or a Rose was he didn't want to chance the extra attention
A Warhammer specifically the 6D variant on offer, was not a complex machine. It was a mere 1471 BV, and a value just under six million c bills. Enough for him to buy the JumpShip but not to cash out and buy the two Mules by themselves. The two mules came in at 2430 BV roughly speaking he'd done the math.
He cashed in the salvage shares to go ahead and pick up two Catapults of the Combine's direct fire variant... and promptly fed them into the recycle option as soon as no one was looking. It left him with some money to play with, and little bit of salvage... so he'd tell the Davions that yes, he'd go to Halstead with them, that he'd fight... but first he needed to make sure his Rabid Fox was fully repaired... and then go earn a little bit more extra money while he was here.
--
Notes: this was written last month along with the Mallory's world conclusion, its a sort of nominal canon again Rabid Fox Saves the first Prince is based off the very simply you get dropped in a mech into a critical moment if I haven't thrown a link up already I will later plus the essence.
CYOA Reference
Imperator Pax
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CYOA Reference
I linked to Essence of Megamek lab, which I use for a lot of things in the Opening Post,
So Rabid Fox is the combination of that and Drakensis's Simple CYOA
Here is a link to https://docs.google.com/document/d/1eden4TNeOBtrhSjClK8eVcJIiaVGEOzKIq02Pc6OMgM/edit?usp=sharing
a roll of one: Mallory's World 3013 - Ian Davion is about to face Yorinaga Kurita, in the rear-guard of the 4th Davion Guards.
--
I would kind of like to do a you're the Davion heir CYOA but on the other hand
Link for reference https://drive.google.com/file/d/1gsEmnxHUYj8m19aMebrt5GaVJDSEhbHc/view?usp=sharing
But that would be a whole lot harder to integrate Essence of Megamek lab into narratively so nothing has come of that. I don't use a whole lot of other essences and I don't reallyhave any interest in crossing over DnD or Harry Potter into BT
I really like Salvaging the Timeline, and I'd like to do something with that https://forum.questionablequesting....discussions-thread.4740/page-298#post-6507681
Also there is the classic of Mage Ohki's Space Heir II: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1SK7JCvb3J8ytG18XZtHDsi0KGVmUOtKdy84lQ-zCdtY/edit#
This one is important not just as a CYOA but also because it uses a time of war stuff, and its notes and roll tables occasionally get used for things that don't use the CYOA by itself. Particularly since I do plan for Ki Abilities, but also Phantom Mech's inclusion so this is useful as a reference for that.
I linked to Essence of Megamek lab, which I use for a lot of things in the Opening Post,
So Rabid Fox is the combination of that and Drakensis's Simple CYOA
Here is a link to https://docs.google.com/document/d/1eden4TNeOBtrhSjClK8eVcJIiaVGEOzKIq02Pc6OMgM/edit?usp=sharing
a roll of one: Mallory's World 3013 - Ian Davion is about to face Yorinaga Kurita, in the rear-guard of the 4th Davion Guards.
--
I would kind of like to do a you're the Davion heir CYOA but on the other hand
Link for reference https://drive.google.com/file/d/1gsEmnxHUYj8m19aMebrt5GaVJDSEhbHc/view?usp=sharing
But that would be a whole lot harder to integrate Essence of Megamek lab into narratively so nothing has come of that. I don't use a whole lot of other essences and I don't reallyhave any interest in crossing over DnD or Harry Potter into BT
I really like Salvaging the Timeline, and I'd like to do something with that https://forum.questionablequesting....discussions-thread.4740/page-298#post-6507681
Also there is the classic of Mage Ohki's Space Heir II: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1SK7JCvb3J8ytG18XZtHDsi0KGVmUOtKdy84lQ-zCdtY/edit#
This one is important not just as a CYOA but also because it uses a time of war stuff, and its notes and roll tables occasionally get used for things that don't use the CYOA by itself. Particularly since I do plan for Ki Abilities, but also Phantom Mech's inclusion so this is useful as a reference for that.
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Reference information
Imperator Pax
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Some other material used frequently is the Battletech Random Mercenary Unit Generator:
https://i.4pcdn.org/tg/1601272396315.pdf (This is technically a CYOA I suppose, and I originally had it linked in that post.)
As is this Battletech Organization Chart:
https://i.4pcdn.org/tg/1471638023717.pdf
and this One:http://www.ci-n.com/~jcampbel/rpgs/battletech/campaigns/toekey.html
--
Specific to HBS related content but still useful for reference (though not a CYOA)
https://battletech.fandom.com/wiki/Battlemech_shop_locations
--
SPAs: https://www.sarna.net/wiki/Special_Pilot_Abilities
Design Quirks: https://www.sarna.net/wiki/Design_Quirks
I will probably include a list of common battlemechs across all stories, or sorted by individual timeline at some point but that will be a separate post that may eventually be expanded to include custom variants or timeline specific production versions and their engines
Also maps
I like this one but think whoever was doing it has stopped updating: https://battletech.rpg.hu/dynmech/planets/ismap_standalone.php?era_id=1&id=39
This one has the Aurigan Reach on it, which is nice and its the other map I use normally
https://www.gruese.de/innersphere/
Again this is not a CYOA but I use the force generation/customization tables here from time to time and its got some useful fluff stuff
https://comstar.home.blog/2022/05/17/campaign-ops-crisis-on-krievci/
https://i.4pcdn.org/tg/1601272396315.pdf (This is technically a CYOA I suppose, and I originally had it linked in that post.)
As is this Battletech Organization Chart:
https://i.4pcdn.org/tg/1471638023717.pdf
and this One:http://www.ci-n.com/~jcampbel/rpgs/battletech/campaigns/toekey.html
--
Specific to HBS related content but still useful for reference (though not a CYOA)
https://battletech.fandom.com/wiki/Battlemech_shop_locations
--
SPAs: https://www.sarna.net/wiki/Special_Pilot_Abilities
Design Quirks: https://www.sarna.net/wiki/Design_Quirks
I will probably include a list of common battlemechs across all stories, or sorted by individual timeline at some point but that will be a separate post that may eventually be expanded to include custom variants or timeline specific production versions and their engines
Also maps
I like this one but think whoever was doing it has stopped updating: https://battletech.rpg.hu/dynmech/planets/ismap_standalone.php?era_id=1&id=39
This one has the Aurigan Reach on it, which is nice and its the other map I use normally
https://www.gruese.de/innersphere/
Again this is not a CYOA but I use the force generation/customization tables here from time to time and its got some useful fluff stuff
https://comstar.home.blog/2022/05/17/campaign-ops-crisis-on-krievci/
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Teaser GWW late 3020s
Imperator Pax
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I normally would not post something this short hence why this will be going up as Extras
The look was pure contempt at the Otomo's request slash demand to the marine officer. "I will not be lectured on honor and duty by the usurper's running dogs. I am an officer of the Terran Hegemony, long live House Cameron."
The clacking of the keys ended as the enter key was struck and then on the screen the words appeared:
Such a reality took a moment to become apparent to the system. Indeed the exact nature of the doom that faced them was not immediately clear. The Terran warmchine at first was merely the nightmare of the age of war. A warship... but something that would have at least held a human crew, would have been vulnerable to attack by human forces.
Its fusion drive bloomed to all the sensors looking skyward. To all sensors in space that were capable of seeing any kind of heat returns.
The Caspar series merely appeared to be a modified Lola class some variation on a classic Star League warship. The Combine's first thoughts were of being able to salvage it, their nominal allies in ComStar, well their concern, were to consider its destruction to prevent it from falling into enemy hands... but then the machine accelerated and more importantly it spoke. The AI's raw emotional, visceral hatred punctuated by the lightning of Naval PPCs opening into the Otomo's JumpShip's inadequately protected port side. The mid section of the Monolith class JumpShip ruptured violently.
This is a teaser of the scene referenced: Here: in Rabid Fox though this segment, the above teaser, is Ghost who walks content.
Post- You want to do what with my Genes?
Lyran Commonwealth Castle Brian
Lyran Commonwealth Castle Brian
The look was pure contempt at the Otomo's request slash demand to the marine officer. "I will not be lectured on honor and duty by the usurper's running dogs. I am an officer of the Terran Hegemony, long live House Cameron."
The clacking of the keys ended as the enter key was struck and then on the screen the words appeared:
Boot sequence initialized.
...
scrawls of abreviated letters, and numerical sequences ran across the screen increasing until they were nearly unreadable.
...
CASPAR Series SDS M5 Boot Sequence Completed.
THS York online.
...
scrawls of abreviated letters, and numerical sequences ran across the screen increasing until they were nearly unreadable.
...
CASPAR Series SDS M5 Boot Sequence Completed.
THS York online.
Such a reality took a moment to become apparent to the system. Indeed the exact nature of the doom that faced them was not immediately clear. The Terran warmchine at first was merely the nightmare of the age of war. A warship... but something that would have at least held a human crew, would have been vulnerable to attack by human forces.
Its fusion drive bloomed to all the sensors looking skyward. To all sensors in space that were capable of seeing any kind of heat returns.
The Caspar series merely appeared to be a modified Lola class some variation on a classic Star League warship. The Combine's first thoughts were of being able to salvage it, their nominal allies in ComStar, well their concern, were to consider its destruction to prevent it from falling into enemy hands... but then the machine accelerated and more importantly it spoke. The AI's raw emotional, visceral hatred punctuated by the lightning of Naval PPCs opening into the Otomo's JumpShip's inadequately protected port side. The mid section of the Monolith class JumpShip ruptured violently.
This is a teaser of the scene referenced: Here: in Rabid Fox though this segment, the above teaser, is Ghost who walks content.
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Extras Rabid Fox Breaks Sword Sakhara defense teaser
Imperator Pax
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Rabid Fox: Combine Attack Sakhara the near future.
"Cowardly freebirth worm." The seventy tonner's pilot hissed as his machine stepped forward. The machines strode past the recently strafed buildings of the Sakhara township. "I am star captain Ryan Thompson. This cluster accepts your challenge."
The machine was in most outward appearances similar to the Vox 280 powered Cataphract that had begun populating training and gunnery classes for second year students. It was not one of the slower versions that were being used to let freshmen get the hang of piloting machines. It was however painted in the distinct colors of the Robinson Assault cluster... and it was one of thirty mechs identical to it.
That visual uniformity and their nominal external similarity was enough to blind observers on both sides... until the clan spec LBX GM Whirlwind 120mm opened up. By inner sphere standards the Trinary of Mechs was a reinforced company.
It was reinforced company supported by two triumphs worth of eighty ton vehicles. Another twenty clan vehicles formed outriders firing missiles not actually found in contemporary clan arsenals. Not that anyone would have immediately zeroed in on that, especially not with air support massing.
The clan spec Cataphracht was a 'mere' 1905 BV. It was subject to some of the same vulnerabilities as much the Sakhara garrison in terms of operations in a prolonged engagement. Its two lbx fives were supported by a pair of clan ER mediums and a chest mounted ER large laser of the same model found on the Rabid Fox B... and of course the star captain commanding the thirty mechs was all too inclined to inform the draconis combine that they were attacking Sakhara because they were cowards who wouldn't have done so if they thought they might be attacking the force at strength... that the 'fox khan' might have been present.
Then he called them such things as the usurper's running dogs and generally derided the combine's honor, baiting them into advancing heedless of the mass of armor on their flanks.
--
Notes: another short one this takes place probably in the early 3020s its while Henry is off world it could happen as early as 3018 but right now its floating but the Cataphract has just made an appearance in canon and this is its scarier model version showing up.
Now Nightmare Trinary / company of the RAC are not as skilled as the SLDF pilots who comprise the Medium BattleMech Company the cadets have been practicing against but they are still experienced pilots . They also have a serious combined arms weight advantage and a willingness to use it. The other thing is that this is the LBX 5 clan version of the prototype gun on Gene's white horse in GWW.
The Robinson Assault Cluster by the 3020s will be filled out to a full Cluster strength if not necessarily with frontline cluster (pure clan equipment) most of their equipment is still standard inner sphere or is Star League gear skirting appearances but its the uniformity thats really the main thing there. And by that point the SLDF Battle element is also being expanded to a striker regiment (3 Medium Mech Battalions, + 1 heavy mech company, and supporting arms) and those will be up by the time for the formal peace treaty between the FedSuns and Lyrans.
My Genes Teaser
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Pseudo Canon Post 3025 pre3028 ~3027
You want to do what with my genes?
If you kick a hornets nest they tend to give chase, wasps could be observed literally sitting and waiting for days for a threat to reemerge from a house. The Smoke Jaguars had kicked the periphery hornet's nest. He also had to wonder exactly how much of their pride they had had to swallow to reach out to get Kerensky here.You want to do what with my genes?
He looked up expectantly, "Are they done?"
"Kerensky won."
Of course she had. Gene hadn't really considered it likely the Black Widow would actually lose. All the same though the Smoke Jaguars had insisted on some fool honor duel thing ahead of making any actual decision about deployments. "Good." He replied, "Moving on, von Strang has what?"
"At least a company of Rim world republic assault mechs, nothing we haven't fought before, given their colors, I'd guess that they were squirrelled away in cache somewhere." Strang had been preaching holy war, and jihad and all that against the Inner Sphere revenge for all injustices real or perceived... it made sense that he would have had some kind of break in case the Inners came a calling... but if word got out after the Amaris mess he was sending out Rim World Mechs ... well after what had happened rimward then he might very well make a self fulfilling prophecy... assuming that the clans didn't come down early on all their heads. "What has the local Lyran commander said?"
"Not much, he has no idea how to deal with all of this."
"So he's drunk." Chang questioned
"As a skunk." Beau responded with a mix of amusement and resignation. In fairness, if not in defense of the man, he was having to contend with playing host to a regiment's worth of 'properly lyran sized' Elite BattleMechs and their supporting assets... but that wasn't something that they could maintain. Abner was currently speaking with Archon's people, and this was covered, but it was no secret the Commonwealth had questions, and that was without considered the wedding that would be happening next year.
The Federated Commonwealth Alliance document had been signed but the realms had not been joined... there was a lot to do, and still a lot that could go wrong. After Hasek had been dealt with the Federated Suns had needed to make some difficult choices... and that had included uncomfortable alliances with minor powers, and officials, and well things on Capellan front were complicated. There were still targets that would need to be met, things that needed to be done.
He paged through the comms chatter. From what they understood Amaris III, it wasn't entirely clear, had been a nephew of the fat man who had attempted to lead forces of the Republic and then declared himself emperor only to basically get slapped aside by the Commonwealth two hundred years earlier. He wasn't sure exactly how the clans would take that, but it wasn't unreasonable to assume that any Y chromosonal gene line of Amaris as a house would be enough to invite a bad reaction... and it wasn't unreasonable to guess that other worlds of the former rim world might have descendants or pretenders to House Amaris that might just warrant a smash response anyway.
These jokers had apparently come out just because there had been confirmation that one was already dead, rumor along of Von Strang's lunacy might be enough. One problem at a time, "Alright then, inform the Lyran attache on planet with what details about the von Strang's as we can confirm, they're Amaris revanchists, they have rimworld mechs, it would be a good idea to move the civvy populations to shelter that this is going to very likely be bloody."
He resisted the urge to sigh. This was a lyran world... the Inner Sphere had talked about the pirate wars but they hadn't been really subjected to it... not the worst of the atrocities. It certainly hadn't helped that the Aurigan civil war had then broken out, and then tensions had spiked across the spinward rim. The Taurians loss of the Vincent class corvette Vandenburg, to nominally Capellan forces... though Gene had his suspicions that the Capellans had not had time to mount such an ASF attack, even though he was confident the Capellans had known, had put the Concordant on notice not just over their posturing aimed at the fed suns but also with the Confederation.
... and presumably now the other states...
The Inner Sphere's ambassadors... well the capellans had made the accusation... had publicly accused the Concordant of intentionally nerve gassing its own citizens because knowledge of their 'secret warship restoration', and insert threat of superweapon to galactic peace, and all the rest of the posturing, reaching 'Civilized' space. How much of that was the paranoia infecting the upper levels of the Capellan government Gene wasn't sure, but ComStar seemed to believe it as well. They'd threatened interdiction on the Concordant both for the alleged nerve gas attacks that the Concordant had blamed on the davions, as well as the work on other WMDs (what warships effectively were) as well as the failure to protect HPGs. ComStar was even now trying to hire mercenaries to train up its 'ComsGuard Militia'... but the Inner Sphere were at least for the moment adamant against allowing the phone company basing rights for 'mech units with the Combine being the most vocally opposed to the idea, but the Federated Suns weren't far behind the snakes either.
...but that was only part of the problem... these Smoke Jaguars their presence worried him.
Right now though the Smoke Jaguars were the problem, as were these Rimworld remnants and what might happen if fighting spilled into a civilian population center. He looked at Septim, the Merlin pilot nodded. "I'll handle the liaison work boss, and integrate us with the local LCAF defense forces." Establish a defensive perimeter... and hope to god that the von Strangs didn't pull a nuke out of their ass. They didn't have any evidence of that... but with the rim world well you never knew what one was potentially going to be up against. "Are you going to handle Kerensky?"
"I will speak with Captain Kerensky yes." He replied to question with as equal ... reservation to how the Lyran had asked. The Black Widow was potentially as unpredictable in this situation as the von Strangs were, and he still wasn't entirely sure what was going on 'over there', but he knew he didn't like it.
--
Notes: this is completely unrelated to the MW5 Combine DLC... but i have been meaning to reinstall MW5 and a list of mods and replay (along with HBS), anyway this 'nominally canon' for GWW but it is almost a full decade into the future from where we are currently, so its a ways out there even accounting for the time skips that occur due to BT travel times... but there are clear hints to things from between the current chapters and the 'now' of this content.
Luxen Volunteers Pirate Wars Post Arano 1
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Luxen Volunteers Pirate Wars Post Arano 1
Short adjusted her new uniform... it was still taking some getting used to... not because it was really that different but because things had been hectic. Amber and Mimi were currently taking their Vindicators out on the field... the looming threat of Black Jack had actually increased over the last few months as he ramped up the pressure on outlying worlds once again raking inward towards the Magistracy's frontier, and Luxen's planetary government had finally approved a budget to better support the volunteers.
They were being called the Luxen Dragoons now... and she half wondered if that was why they were getting more money from the government. Did the fancier name really warrant her increased salary? Not that she was complaining, but the name change had seemed premature up until the last few days.... but in the last few days things had started to change.
As an older, wiser Major in the Dragoons would look back from the 3020s with the realization that the name change, and the pay increase that had come with it all was marketting as much as anything else, that it had been the Armed Forces looking to head off loss of personnel. It was about retention, and that had been pretty prescient since while they had known Black Jack's raids were getting worse they hadn't at that point in 3019 figured out how bad it was going to get.
All she had known for the past few months was they'd gotten a fancier name. Their mechs hadn't changed, and she'd been as shocked as everyone else when the new machines had started arriving. Well new was a stretch, they were the star league era machines they had dragged out of that snow ball of a world but when they had gotten back she hadn't even thought about them... not after the second battle of Luxen... which was where some of the other 'new' mechs were coming from... just as some of those other new mechs had probably been salvaged from the 'first' Battle of Luxen.
Today though, was the day it was really starting to set in.
Her lance wasn't just a packet attached to a bunch of tanks and crunchies anymore. Not that it'd been just a lance for a while. The battles of Luxen had demonstrated that they had to fight as a unified 'mech force rather than just penny packetting out a mech here or there... but today was going to mark the day they started getting new 'Mechs.
They were supposed to be getting, officially getting, their assault mechs today. They were chargers but they were heavier mechs. The briefing packet on the table basically came in though with the header of disregarding anything they'd been told about Chargers previous to this. That the work that had been done on the Star League era Machines had rendered them into fundamentally different machines.
The author of that statement was right.
To the detriment of veterans who had raided Combine worlds fought chargers and thus thought they knew what they were getting into ... as Black Jack's pirates would find out before long, that these were not standard chargers anymore.
In the periphery even more so than the Inner Sphere, any mech was still a mech.
Especially 3019 when it was still a few years out from Lady Raventhir started production of Chargers, never mind her licensing out for domestic production of the Merlins that would be even later in the decade.
Short wasn't surprised when the table elicited complaints from one of the new 'Dragoon' pilots about most of the new mechs going to even 'newer' pilots being brought in to staff 2nd Battalion's twenty four mechs.
Not that all of them were ready.
"Get Amber, and Mimi back in," She ordered ignoring the complaint from Kato, because she had the feeling that even with a handful of new Chargers and Cicadas deemed ready the Volunteers were going to be expected to learn something today...
--
The Major ... err Colonel now, looked like he had grown a couple of inches, but it was hard to tell otherwise his face had been sharp lines and bright eyes in 3016 and the uniform he wore different than anyone else's... or it had been. He'd been the only one wearing the full body combat environmental suit before.
Shepherd looked over to a young officer, about Short's age , "Akashi, you're up." The woman piloted a Griffin but it had been heavily modified and the techs armoring up the Chargers had seemingly modified the profile after it for aesthetics sake.
"In many respects the weapons load out is designed to replicate with available resources the Thug series of BattleMechs. An emphasis is on survivability. The SRM packet is intended only to serve as a close in weapon, ideally to finish off an opponent." The Griffin pilot remarked sibilantly with an almost frigid expression. "With two particle projector cannons and the pitban 320 providing power you should be able to remain at range and suppress or destroy an enemy position in conjunction with the other units."
Due to the volume of Amaris's secret army, even though the Charger hadn't been an especially good mech design there were an abundance of spare parts for the techs to play with. With spare parts, and with domestic production of weapons, and what was avaiable on the open market the Magistracy's chargers and cicadas for that matter were to be part of the late 3rd Succession Wars technological renaissance ... and looking back. The Magistracy's recovery would start before, though most of the inner sphere chauvinists ignored it, before the arrival of a copy of the library core that offered a way forward out of the technological backslide and stagnation.
Of course part of that was the fact that Short didn't realize that there was , there were people worse than Black Jack out there, and in 3019 while the news was still making the circuits she still hadn't realized how desperate the pirate king was becoming as he continued to spiral around.
For Short Kommando Kelly ... the disgraced ComStar ROM Precentor never, and never would, entered into the equation. In 3019 the only immediate concern was the direct pirate threat escalating across the frontier of the periphery. Questions of production, manufacturing, or the technical side installation didn't enter into it.
They weren't yet into preparing the Luxen Dragoons for actual combat this was the beginning of arming new green recruits to fill out slots in the unit, and test out and see what their allocated machines could do. Because she wasn't in the rotation, and it was all the fresh intakes to the unit Short stood on the deck, while the 'Mech Warrior lectured, and then watched as the handful of chargers that were ready were assigned to the first pilots, and they were lead out onto the course west of Luxen's capital city and overlooking the curve of the river.
The next batch, predictably enough she supposed, were the Merlin Heavy BattleMechs that had been delivered to Lady Raventhir, and the familiar appearance of one of the Luxen contract mercenaries stepped forward. The lyran was more personable and friendly than his younger female counterpart, and ran through what had changed on his Merlin, versus the stock factory Merlin like the machine he had used during the two previous battles on Luxen. There was a brief moment where he talked to the assembled about what the Merlins might need changed on their machines for improved performance but that would be up to the Regimental Staff.
Then after Septim lead that group off another mercenary stood up to manage the Cicada pilots. Apparently his own Cicada was the basis of the modifications rendered to the Cicada group, and had been built off of the modifications to the Mercenary Schaeffer's machine, the only KIA among the mercenary mechwarriors during the 2nd Luxen Contract against Black Jack's pirates.
Shepherd nodded to the mechs, "If this goes well, 1st Battalion," Which was basically just Easy company with some infantry backed up by Marsden tanks, or at least had been up until the last few months, "will get another company of mechs we're looking at rearming a platoon of Dervishes just to insure there are some long rang missiles available, but you will eventually receive a dozen of the modified charger design for that company."
--
Notes: https://forum.questionablequesting....-battletech-isekai.15094/page-29#post-6480712 https://forum.questionablequesting....-battletech-isekai.15094/page-28#post-6478882
Rabid Fox Prologue Content Mallory's World Conclusion
Imperator Pax
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Battletech Junkyard Rabid Fox Prologue Content
Mallory's World Conclusion
Mallory's World Conclusion
He tapped the pen on the paper. As he sat there half looking through the transparent ferro aluminium view port, he sort of wished he was a better negotiator... or really more accurately that he had some idea of what they even were doing, but it was more or less agreed on. He'd go to Hallstead station with the Davions. He'd be attached to the AFFS's 7th Crucis Lancers... and they'd fight the Combine
... in financial compensation terms they were paying more a day for the use of his new dropship collars than anything...
He continued to tap the pen... a part of him when he'd first ended up in this mess wanted to demand the Davions provide him passage to ... well he'd almost said the Aurigan Reach, but settled for the periphery in general, because fuck this inner sphere succession war crap... and yet here he was... wow he felt like a special kind of idiot... because the 70 ton rabid fox was clan tech.
... he could justify to himself it was because he wanted to make sure that the Halstead station university library needed to be found ... but then what. Would Ian Davion do what Hanse did? Would NAIS come about, had he fucked things up for preparing the Inner Sphere to face the clans.
He groaned and rested his head on the table turning away from the view port...
... maybe it didn't even fucking matter maybe the Gray Death Legion would go find Helm anyway and everything would be mostly fine... or maybe things would be mostly fine and the clans would invade and the Inner Sphere would just drown Kerensky's Crazies in logistics and bodies and a case of reality ensues... maybe he didn't need to go but he had signed on to go to Halstead.
He glanced up as the rotating holovid footage showed the Robinson Rangers chasing the Benjamin Regulars all the way back to their dropships; the footage was a couple days old. They'd gotten away but the Rangers had still decimated the enemy's mech force, and left tanks smoldering along the highway for miles. It was part of a cycle of images emphasizing various Davion contributions that focused on the Combine being run off like whipped dogs.
He had noticed that there didn't seem to be any footage of the Kell Hounds fighting the heavier mech unit of the two Dieron regulars... well there was probably footage but it wasn't making the news broadcasters daily cycle of battle footage.
"Whatever." He muttered to himself. He turned to look out the window to the two Mules parked dirt side... the other thing that was going to make him more money than just day to day mech piloting... he wanted to groan at the perceived unfairness ... had he really acclimated to MechWarrior Chaunvism that fast? Kind of... but Logistics was what won battles, and that won wars. It sustained, and propelled the advance, even if it wasn't glamorous.
He coughed and sat up... details percolating in his head. Fuck, if they were going to Halstead ... well his mech didn't have hands, and fuck. Hadn't the Davions burned a bunch of books to deny them to the combine... he took a look at the one of the DropShips. They had spawned into existence attached to the Star Lord fully crewed, but ... well he had cargo space, they'd need trucks though.
He pulled out the computer panel and buzzed the DropShip captain to pester them about questions.
--
The downside to the Mule was that it didn't have space for mech bays. Not that it would matter. The 'brigands', the call sign for the Davion unit, would be hitching a ride on his Star Lord and carrying his mech aboard their Union but he'd be bunking aboard the JumpShip.
A mule was significantly more massive than the 3600 tons of a Union. Over three times as massive. The 11k + tons meant it had cargo bays that were close to the Union's own mass, each being 2700 + tons of cargo space. Cargo Space that the AFFS was loading up to support the campaign
Two mules loaded with cargo and another four collars (well three counting the collar taken up by the Brigands Union) made the prospect of attacking the combine much simpler. Those collars would probably be taken up by dropships ferrying units from the Robinson Rangers as the 7th crucis lancers had their own JumpShips to carry the main regiment of that Davion formation. The same was true for the 4th Davion Guards, as well as the Kell Hounds.
The problem was that ... well fuck whether or not his name was on the owner's title of this hardware, or what his battle roms showed up, he was the youngest pilot present. Being a teenager sucked even in a neo feudal stompy robot future. He had to resist pulling out the, 'we can settle this with our mechs card' but it was sorely tempting to do so.
... contract stipulations were the dropships would haul supplies for the davions, They'd do that. They'd go to Halstead. They'd get all this done, and hope Ian Davion took the vault full of Star League era books to New Avalon, made the NAIS all it could be and then they could fuck off... to wherever... wherever hopefully being far away from the Combine.
It wasn't Masha Badanoff's fault, but he had found himself in what charitably could be described as MechWarrior Frat Boy central. Part of that problem was the announcement that they'd be reinforcing with replacement units. Specifically that there was a bulletin going around that the militia regiments would be replaced by other units.
1st Davion Guards would be coming in, and they weren't the only ones who hadn't participated... but it made sense. The fighting on Mallory's World had been severe there had to be replacements, and the fighting on Halstead station wasn't aimed at the same sort of objectives.
Still that ultimately boiled down to his age... and not having other mechwarriors backing him up. He needed more BV, so he'd need to get good salvage. With the tiny amount daily being absurd in time frame to get anything really good... no he needed stuff that could be turned into BV that he could then use for other things...
Not just the exploitable JumpShips, which could have been down right economy breaking but also the skill points... he scratched his nose as he threatened to sneeze, "Look we're not getting anywhere, and frankly I have better things to do." There was a low and ridiculous ooh, and a hand got a little close.
He considered thathe might have ... have totally spent BV to generate the available DEST commando option... but given the situation what with the fighting the combine and being on the Davion side... the relatively expensive Davion MI6 option for infantry made more safer sense. And that meant that there was a large SAS man in the MechWarrior's face before things got out hand.
... and if some mech jock wanted to assume something well let him assume something, but whatever the case he was looking forward to getting off world, and getting through everything that was going to go on.
--
Notes: SO in Rabid Fox Henry wakes up in his Rabid Fox and runs up on Yorinaga Kurita and his battalion on Mallory, and then after Mallory as suggested here goes on to Halstead and then there is a time skip where two years later he's at Sakhara and its at that point where he's really begun abusing his essence to start the logistical ball rolling
Down From the Mountain Intro Scrap
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Down from the Mountain
Introduction
Saman Dara begged merciful god for the time to plead his case. The Mechanical Djinn had every reason to mistrust him... and it certainly did not help that he was here two centuries too late, that he was the only one of his lineage to succeed in fulfilling an oath sworn to the keeper of house honor to reach this tomb built by Terra's protectors.
At least death would be quick.
If the Djinnstanding watch over his sleeping charges decided against him then the lasers would kill him in an instant. The mechanical spiders and the turrets watched his every move. They waited for a provocation Dara could not conscious giving.
It did not matter of course, if he died here, then he ad succeeded where generations had failed. The indicator lights, and the lights beyond, the trembling of the ground beneath his boots told him the castle was waking. He had done what many Azami had sought to do, to fulfill the oath sworn to Lady Kira to wake from slumber a last Terran force. Frozen in time, Heron Arsacid slept, he had along with the remnant of a Terran force slept waiting orders from House Cameron... and thankfully spared the knowledge that Lady Kira's brother the reigning coordinator had conspired with the Satan Amaris.
The tube decanted and eyes opened.
"Colonel the facility is approaching operational readiness." The djinn spoke a soft feminine voice, belying the steel that lay in wait.
"Thank you Erineyes."
"Excellency, I beg your pardon." Dara began. The Azami knelt, "Please, we must speak." He had of course provided the message from Lady Kira entrusted to his ancestors, for the machine spirit to review, but even so... it bore addressing in person. Never mind that he had the responsibility to tell the demon king of the sixth heaven all that he had missed with regards to the combine and the davion's he had defended as a young warrior in the intervening centuries.
Dara paid no mind to the growing storm of light as holograms appeared populating. He had already been aware that Katinka probably had surface to orbit weapons... even it those had likely been laid to waste in battle against the Satan Amaris's forces. One of the great satan's ships had fired a mass driver into the planet, destroying the surface facility.
A facility withdrawn of course, empty buildings. The displays of many hundreds of thousands of stasis tubes showed that while only a fraction of the numbers who had set out on Kerensky's exodus there were many terrans who slept here. More than he had dreamed. Perhaps enough to staunch the bleeding of the Inner Sphere, and its decline from the loss of Terra. A man could hope after all. He had come this far, and while Lady Kira was long dead having protested as strongly as she could her brother's moral failings, and betrayal of the virtues of a warrior she had not abandoned them.
Heron's head tilted, but was interrupted as he dressed by another voice, a highland lieutenant colonel appearing dressed, "From what Erineyes says the coordinator threw a nuclear temper tantrum, like he was a bloody Taurian, colonel."
Dara frowned bitterly at the mention of Helm, and the depots denied to the coordinator, "It is true, but it is more than that, I bring word that, Kira-sama ordered Anjin sama to the stasis tubes in a known Terran fall back position built in the Magistracy of Canopus."
--
Gene Shepherd had accepted the Davion contract because there really hadn't been any other choice... and he certainly hadn't had a choice after the Highlanders had made contact. Not that he liked being put in that position. "You've made impressive strides Mr Clay."
Henry Clay gave a broad smile, dressed in civilian attire as he was, unobtrusive oxford tweed like many of the clamoring Davion administrators, "I appreciate you opening the depot for me and that machinery here," Here on Dieron, "That will make a world of difference for the Federated Suns."
They were young men about the same age... and both officially Brevet Colonels. Clay had been nominally the officer in command of the AFFS force at Altair. Mostly because the duke of Bristol had the ear of the First Prince, and because he commanded the 19th Striker Regiment, and had landed with the blessing of Ian Davion to direct the Hussars, and Blue Star Irregulars in an envelopment. He hadn't fought as Gene would have done it, but as soon as the HPG station on Dieron had been taken a representative from the Precentor New Avalon travelling with the Dieron expedition had arrived to officiate folding the HPG station into PNA's diocese of sorts.
Gene didn't pretend to understand the technology worshiping ecclesiastic organization. They were very strange, a very strange facet of the world he had woken up in. Henry Clay was a famous MechWarrior, and popular magnate... but there was no getting around he was young. Clay had mounted the 19th's assault when the broadcast of Dieron's surrender had been broadcast through the news service... and as the Combine was realizing the damage done to the Sword of Light defending Dieron.
Clay had destroyed a sword of light regiment in his own time, somehow provoking the bulk of the regiment on Mallory's World into a double envelopment and allowing the Robinson Rangers to charge up their backside after being mauled. There were only limited recordings of the fight, and thus it was a very opaque battle.
Nothing like the Campaigns for Dieron, or Altair of the past few weeks... never mind the savaging they had done defending Elidere... and he'd been concerned with how that had played out. The Duke of Elidere had sent an emergency request, pleading for aid and reinforcements, and the Davions had responded by scrambling troops along a JumpShip Circuit that ran from the Crucis to Draconis Marchs.
Clay nodded, still smiling, "I accept that you have humanitarian responsibilities to those folks up there, more than most... I personally don't want those civilians getting caught up, but we really could use your help Colonel Shepherd, and Ian is talking about trade ties with the Commonwealth. By the time you get back from the periphery, I should be in a position to fill any future orders. "In truth, Gene had expected to need to rely more heavily on the depots. The Davions had paid handsomely for saving Elidere and savaging the Combine's DropShips, the Duke of House Makios elated at the turn in the fortunes... and then there was the Dieron bonus and funds. "I'm in pretty good with Blackwell, besides,"
"They have ties with the Dragoons."
"Yeah, its a little awkward at times," The Duke of Bristol chuckled... then he trailed off, "Actually, Ian is pretty insistent on telling the Wolves personally." About the collaboration between the coordinator and Amaris, "He's trying to get them to come to New Avalon... I think the response he'll get from them is ... more magnified than he realizes." Clay paused again as another DropShip began to taxi to a hangar on Dieron's capital space port massive ferrocrete pad. Supplies for House Davion's new colonial government ... "They're descendants of Kerensky's Exodus you know." Clay remarked. "You should know that I think more than most people. As it is, after beating down Samsonov and his Atlas my friends among the Horse clan would love to trade pointers, just friendly sport mind you but, you being who you are. Especially with your armor accomplishments, they like combined arms quite a lot."
That was the other problem, the Davion High Command knew he was a fish out of water, a Terran out of time. Ian was enthused, "You had some inkling of that business didn't you?"
"That the Combine had given away the 19th's positions to Amaris, yes I knew that much, I had told Ian that much before you came. That there was an HPG, a live recording of him giving Amaris support, agreeing to deny the SLDF basing positions and feeding them positions. Now that I didn't know... I mean it when you get back, whatever you need materially I should be able to have a factory build it. If you and the Highlanders want more Highlanders, between Bristol and New Avalon I can build the parts, and put them together. If you have enough of them out of storage, and you can give me a few more years, I'll focus on just making sure you have spare parts, and that we won't lose the design if something happens again... and the factories can build other stuff."
--
Notes: This is absent dates because this is a tentative introduction
Introduction
Saman Dara begged merciful god for the time to plead his case. The Mechanical Djinn had every reason to mistrust him... and it certainly did not help that he was here two centuries too late, that he was the only one of his lineage to succeed in fulfilling an oath sworn to the keeper of house honor to reach this tomb built by Terra's protectors.
At least death would be quick.
If the Djinnstanding watch over his sleeping charges decided against him then the lasers would kill him in an instant. The mechanical spiders and the turrets watched his every move. They waited for a provocation Dara could not conscious giving.
It did not matter of course, if he died here, then he ad succeeded where generations had failed. The indicator lights, and the lights beyond, the trembling of the ground beneath his boots told him the castle was waking. He had done what many Azami had sought to do, to fulfill the oath sworn to Lady Kira to wake from slumber a last Terran force. Frozen in time, Heron Arsacid slept, he had along with the remnant of a Terran force slept waiting orders from House Cameron... and thankfully spared the knowledge that Lady Kira's brother the reigning coordinator had conspired with the Satan Amaris.
The tube decanted and eyes opened.
"Colonel the facility is approaching operational readiness." The djinn spoke a soft feminine voice, belying the steel that lay in wait.
"Thank you Erineyes."
"Excellency, I beg your pardon." Dara began. The Azami knelt, "Please, we must speak." He had of course provided the message from Lady Kira entrusted to his ancestors, for the machine spirit to review, but even so... it bore addressing in person. Never mind that he had the responsibility to tell the demon king of the sixth heaven all that he had missed with regards to the combine and the davion's he had defended as a young warrior in the intervening centuries.
Dara paid no mind to the growing storm of light as holograms appeared populating. He had already been aware that Katinka probably had surface to orbit weapons... even it those had likely been laid to waste in battle against the Satan Amaris's forces. One of the great satan's ships had fired a mass driver into the planet, destroying the surface facility.
A facility withdrawn of course, empty buildings. The displays of many hundreds of thousands of stasis tubes showed that while only a fraction of the numbers who had set out on Kerensky's exodus there were many terrans who slept here. More than he had dreamed. Perhaps enough to staunch the bleeding of the Inner Sphere, and its decline from the loss of Terra. A man could hope after all. He had come this far, and while Lady Kira was long dead having protested as strongly as she could her brother's moral failings, and betrayal of the virtues of a warrior she had not abandoned them.
Heron's head tilted, but was interrupted as he dressed by another voice, a highland lieutenant colonel appearing dressed, "From what Erineyes says the coordinator threw a nuclear temper tantrum, like he was a bloody Taurian, colonel."
Dara frowned bitterly at the mention of Helm, and the depots denied to the coordinator, "It is true, but it is more than that, I bring word that, Kira-sama ordered Anjin sama to the stasis tubes in a known Terran fall back position built in the Magistracy of Canopus."
--
Gene Shepherd had accepted the Davion contract because there really hadn't been any other choice... and he certainly hadn't had a choice after the Highlanders had made contact. Not that he liked being put in that position. "You've made impressive strides Mr Clay."
Henry Clay gave a broad smile, dressed in civilian attire as he was, unobtrusive oxford tweed like many of the clamoring Davion administrators, "I appreciate you opening the depot for me and that machinery here," Here on Dieron, "That will make a world of difference for the Federated Suns."
They were young men about the same age... and both officially Brevet Colonels. Clay had been nominally the officer in command of the AFFS force at Altair. Mostly because the duke of Bristol had the ear of the First Prince, and because he commanded the 19th Striker Regiment, and had landed with the blessing of Ian Davion to direct the Hussars, and Blue Star Irregulars in an envelopment. He hadn't fought as Gene would have done it, but as soon as the HPG station on Dieron had been taken a representative from the Precentor New Avalon travelling with the Dieron expedition had arrived to officiate folding the HPG station into PNA's diocese of sorts.
Gene didn't pretend to understand the technology worshiping ecclesiastic organization. They were very strange, a very strange facet of the world he had woken up in. Henry Clay was a famous MechWarrior, and popular magnate... but there was no getting around he was young. Clay had mounted the 19th's assault when the broadcast of Dieron's surrender had been broadcast through the news service... and as the Combine was realizing the damage done to the Sword of Light defending Dieron.
Clay had destroyed a sword of light regiment in his own time, somehow provoking the bulk of the regiment on Mallory's World into a double envelopment and allowing the Robinson Rangers to charge up their backside after being mauled. There were only limited recordings of the fight, and thus it was a very opaque battle.
Nothing like the Campaigns for Dieron, or Altair of the past few weeks... never mind the savaging they had done defending Elidere... and he'd been concerned with how that had played out. The Duke of Elidere had sent an emergency request, pleading for aid and reinforcements, and the Davions had responded by scrambling troops along a JumpShip Circuit that ran from the Crucis to Draconis Marchs.
Clay nodded, still smiling, "I accept that you have humanitarian responsibilities to those folks up there, more than most... I personally don't want those civilians getting caught up, but we really could use your help Colonel Shepherd, and Ian is talking about trade ties with the Commonwealth. By the time you get back from the periphery, I should be in a position to fill any future orders. "In truth, Gene had expected to need to rely more heavily on the depots. The Davions had paid handsomely for saving Elidere and savaging the Combine's DropShips, the Duke of House Makios elated at the turn in the fortunes... and then there was the Dieron bonus and funds. "I'm in pretty good with Blackwell, besides,"
"They have ties with the Dragoons."
"Yeah, its a little awkward at times," The Duke of Bristol chuckled... then he trailed off, "Actually, Ian is pretty insistent on telling the Wolves personally." About the collaboration between the coordinator and Amaris, "He's trying to get them to come to New Avalon... I think the response he'll get from them is ... more magnified than he realizes." Clay paused again as another DropShip began to taxi to a hangar on Dieron's capital space port massive ferrocrete pad. Supplies for House Davion's new colonial government ... "They're descendants of Kerensky's Exodus you know." Clay remarked. "You should know that I think more than most people. As it is, after beating down Samsonov and his Atlas my friends among the Horse clan would love to trade pointers, just friendly sport mind you but, you being who you are. Especially with your armor accomplishments, they like combined arms quite a lot."
That was the other problem, the Davion High Command knew he was a fish out of water, a Terran out of time. Ian was enthused, "You had some inkling of that business didn't you?"
"That the Combine had given away the 19th's positions to Amaris, yes I knew that much, I had told Ian that much before you came. That there was an HPG, a live recording of him giving Amaris support, agreeing to deny the SLDF basing positions and feeding them positions. Now that I didn't know... I mean it when you get back, whatever you need materially I should be able to have a factory build it. If you and the Highlanders want more Highlanders, between Bristol and New Avalon I can build the parts, and put them together. If you have enough of them out of storage, and you can give me a few more years, I'll focus on just making sure you have spare parts, and that we won't lose the design if something happens again... and the factories can build other stuff."
--
Notes: This is absent dates because this is a tentative introduction
Down from the mountain 2
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Imperator Pax
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Down from the mountain 2
TimeStamp:c.3020
The MechWarrior groaned running a hand through her hair as she watched mechanics work down below on the dozens of armored machines. Her life was a confused mess, even more so than it had been
She wasn't even sure anymore what she should go by. Who was she now? Was she Anastasia Volkov... did there need to be a hyphen was she supposed to give it should it be... Volkov Raventhir... or Volkov Abner... "uhg" suddenly being royalty sucked. She'd been happy... more free being a mercenary. Apart of her was sore. She was a magistracy citizen her company had had mechs. More than that they had good mechs, but instead of rushing them to Luxen they had... the hiring contract had gone out to not even a real company, but as many mercs with 'mechs as could be scrounged up. The logic had been that those pilots who had made up the 'Scratch Force' or scratch company to relieve Luxen had experience fighting the raiders, and of course it had all paid off in the end hadn't it?
... but she hadn't gotten an offer until after that contract was up... not that she would have had any luck muscling in on the veterans like some idiots had tried to do. Black Jack had come to call, or at least some of his running dogs... and they had gotten stomped by the volunteers under mercenary local leadership... it had taken long for complaints to mount though.
Part of it was the political opposition to her current employer for not keeping her original pick of mercenary company employed. The more strenuous complaints had been the pseudo outrage that the mercenary company had not been folded into the Magistracy's own regular armed forces
Anastasia had gotten the job to replace Shepherd's Company… because of her reputation, the swirling miasma of rumor and facts surrounding her separation from the MAF that had been a double edged sword for her little company of mechwariors. Separation was a clean word, it wasn't quite a dishonorable discharge but it had been other than honorable... under a cloud for disobeying the order to leave things alone... but all of a sudden having a feral wolf around was something that seemed like a good thing... that and with Shepherd's company having been called into the Inner Sphere far away had push the hiring approval through for onboarding the company.
She had gotten the job because of the terror black jack's pirates inspired. Not because they thought she was a hero... she didn't have that reputation. The news always showed the Scratch Company's leadership in the best of light. Shepherd's battle rom showed him cutting down the enemy in precise flashing blasts of man made lightning... not pummeling the enemy in a ferocious rage of battle fist and armored feet. She'd never have the reputation as shining heaven sent sword from the sky... that was something she'd resigned herself to. The idea that Magistracy might not look at her as a disgraced soldier turning mercenary to make a living, even though her adopted family had been a mercenary.
It was an opportunity to protect people, her people... her people more than she had even realized....and that just reminded her of how much she needed a fucking drink...but just getting the job her on Luxen had been the biggest landing of her mechwarrior career and they couldn't turn it down. Not with what they were being offered for that kind of contract... but there was still the why they were getting the offer that galled her.
The alcohol in her flask sloshed around as she jostled with the screw, only realizing too late she wasn't alone on the mezzanine brooding. She whirled. The tall dark haired man raised an eyebrow. In open defiance she took a swig of the vodka letting it burn all the way down. She didn't have any desire to play the demure stereotype she expected Inners to like after he'd sprung the blood test on her, and her team earlier today.
There was a flittering of light as the Terran Machine intelligence projected into the room... a reminder that even though they were on Luxen, this may as well have been one of those fortresses of techno sorcery the Old Earth that was had built... except it had been built as a sign of deepening of ties between the Aurigan Coalition and the Magistracy of Canopus.
"If you tell me I'm upset I'm going to slug you." The eyebrow raised further, she felt the flush creep up her features as she moved unsteadily. Anastasia wasn't afraid of heights or speaking her mind, but she meant the threat... even if she recognized the chance of landing the punch were slim. She waved the flask in her hand, "I had a family that raised me, fed me clothed me," Her father figure growing up had told her that their outfit had come to look for survivors … and she'd been it... Payne had run a small time merc unit, and had put money back to buy her a commission into the MAF... and … and she'd thrown that away for revenge in her first real engagement. Disobeying orders to avenge a unit of poor bloody infantryman who'd been slaughtered by the invaders... that had been before Black Jack just another callous act of violence that pervaded the succession wars. "And now I'm what a princess, because of who my biological parents were? Parents I don't even remember."
"It was an oversight by the Magistracy, that you slipped through the cracks."
"So how did you find it?" She demanded... well aware that regardless of how patient Arsacid appeared that Hide hadn't called the man 'the demon king' for no reason... and that was the same appellation Hathaway had used but with completely different undertones. Hathaway, her closest friend, was in awe of the living legend... and he terrified her best MechWarrior who normally put up such a resolutely stoic facade that for it show to... she didn't know how to deal with it except to react angrily to the infuriating paternalism the man expressed towards them. "Why did it show up?"
The light flickered, "Because we were looking for traces."
Heron nodded in agreement with the AI, "Colonel Shepherd was young," She grit her teeth, "when the war broke out, but when he woke up there were signs of a Terran exodus into the Rimward periphery. The Aurigans are descendants of SLDF personnel." That wasn't news the Aurigans loved the Star League, lamented its loss, spoke highly of the SLDF as preservers of the peace, and guardians of civilization if you ever let them talk about it. They were idealists... and then someone had woken Arsacid and his men up on the fringes of Aurigan space a couple of years ago and the Coalition had welcomed them into the fold happily greeting their long sleeping relations into the Aurigan government as the Arsacid March... and the Magistracy had lept at the chance to deepen relations with the young Periphery state, because for the Aurigans who had already been industrially well situated were all of sudden capable of doing so much more.
Down from the mountain 2
TimeStamp:c.3020
The MechWarrior groaned running a hand through her hair as she watched mechanics work down below on the dozens of armored machines. Her life was a confused mess, even more so than it had been
She wasn't even sure anymore what she should go by. Who was she now? Was she Anastasia Volkov... did there need to be a hyphen was she supposed to give it should it be... Volkov Raventhir... or Volkov Abner... "uhg" suddenly being royalty sucked. She'd been happy... more free being a mercenary. Apart of her was sore. She was a magistracy citizen her company had had mechs. More than that they had good mechs, but instead of rushing them to Luxen they had... the hiring contract had gone out to not even a real company, but as many mercs with 'mechs as could be scrounged up. The logic had been that those pilots who had made up the 'Scratch Force' or scratch company to relieve Luxen had experience fighting the raiders, and of course it had all paid off in the end hadn't it?
... but she hadn't gotten an offer until after that contract was up... not that she would have had any luck muscling in on the veterans like some idiots had tried to do. Black Jack had come to call, or at least some of his running dogs... and they had gotten stomped by the volunteers under mercenary local leadership... it had taken long for complaints to mount though.
Part of it was the political opposition to her current employer for not keeping her original pick of mercenary company employed. The more strenuous complaints had been the pseudo outrage that the mercenary company had not been folded into the Magistracy's own regular armed forces
Anastasia had gotten the job to replace Shepherd's Company… because of her reputation, the swirling miasma of rumor and facts surrounding her separation from the MAF that had been a double edged sword for her little company of mechwariors. Separation was a clean word, it wasn't quite a dishonorable discharge but it had been other than honorable... under a cloud for disobeying the order to leave things alone... but all of a sudden having a feral wolf around was something that seemed like a good thing... that and with Shepherd's company having been called into the Inner Sphere far away had push the hiring approval through for onboarding the company.
She had gotten the job because of the terror black jack's pirates inspired. Not because they thought she was a hero... she didn't have that reputation. The news always showed the Scratch Company's leadership in the best of light. Shepherd's battle rom showed him cutting down the enemy in precise flashing blasts of man made lightning... not pummeling the enemy in a ferocious rage of battle fist and armored feet. She'd never have the reputation as shining heaven sent sword from the sky... that was something she'd resigned herself to. The idea that Magistracy might not look at her as a disgraced soldier turning mercenary to make a living, even though her adopted family had been a mercenary.
It was an opportunity to protect people, her people... her people more than she had even realized....and that just reminded her of how much she needed a fucking drink...but just getting the job her on Luxen had been the biggest landing of her mechwarrior career and they couldn't turn it down. Not with what they were being offered for that kind of contract... but there was still the why they were getting the offer that galled her.
The alcohol in her flask sloshed around as she jostled with the screw, only realizing too late she wasn't alone on the mezzanine brooding. She whirled. The tall dark haired man raised an eyebrow. In open defiance she took a swig of the vodka letting it burn all the way down. She didn't have any desire to play the demure stereotype she expected Inners to like after he'd sprung the blood test on her, and her team earlier today.
There was a flittering of light as the Terran Machine intelligence projected into the room... a reminder that even though they were on Luxen, this may as well have been one of those fortresses of techno sorcery the Old Earth that was had built... except it had been built as a sign of deepening of ties between the Aurigan Coalition and the Magistracy of Canopus.
"If you tell me I'm upset I'm going to slug you." The eyebrow raised further, she felt the flush creep up her features as she moved unsteadily. Anastasia wasn't afraid of heights or speaking her mind, but she meant the threat... even if she recognized the chance of landing the punch were slim. She waved the flask in her hand, "I had a family that raised me, fed me clothed me," Her father figure growing up had told her that their outfit had come to look for survivors … and she'd been it... Payne had run a small time merc unit, and had put money back to buy her a commission into the MAF... and … and she'd thrown that away for revenge in her first real engagement. Disobeying orders to avenge a unit of poor bloody infantryman who'd been slaughtered by the invaders... that had been before Black Jack just another callous act of violence that pervaded the succession wars. "And now I'm what a princess, because of who my biological parents were? Parents I don't even remember."
"It was an oversight by the Magistracy, that you slipped through the cracks."
"So how did you find it?" She demanded... well aware that regardless of how patient Arsacid appeared that Hide hadn't called the man 'the demon king' for no reason... and that was the same appellation Hathaway had used but with completely different undertones. Hathaway, her closest friend, was in awe of the living legend... and he terrified her best MechWarrior who normally put up such a resolutely stoic facade that for it show to... she didn't know how to deal with it except to react angrily to the infuriating paternalism the man expressed towards them. "Why did it show up?"
The light flickered, "Because we were looking for traces."
Heron nodded in agreement with the AI, "Colonel Shepherd was young," She grit her teeth, "when the war broke out, but when he woke up there were signs of a Terran exodus into the Rimward periphery. The Aurigans are descendants of SLDF personnel." That wasn't news the Aurigans loved the Star League, lamented its loss, spoke highly of the SLDF as preservers of the peace, and guardians of civilization if you ever let them talk about it. They were idealists... and then someone had woken Arsacid and his men up on the fringes of Aurigan space a couple of years ago and the Coalition had welcomed them into the fold happily greeting their long sleeping relations into the Aurigan government as the Arsacid March... and the Magistracy had lept at the chance to deepen relations with the young Periphery state, because for the Aurigans who had already been industrially well situated were all of sudden capable of doing so much more.