Battletech: The Ghost Who Walks (Battletech Isekai)

Interlude
Beauregard Alexander, captain of Easy Company groaned at the summons. It directed them to the HPG station... them being the triumvirate of officers that had been assembled to coordinate their operations for the defense of Luxen.

If the only thing he had to complain about was that the boss hadn't been thinking and the drunk monk had been doing his job when they had recorded the company name as Shepherd's company it would have been a good day... but he'd stopped having good days weeks ago. Months really. Luxen had an HPG, which meant it was a target, but that had been apparent before the boss had left.

He kicked slightly back from his desk and put the pen away knowing that the other two would be here soon.

His office was part of the star port complex it meant it was in a nice central location easy to navigate a problem. Anything that appeared at the jump points he knew about it. If anything came in through the planetary government or the HPG station simple phone call. It made coordinating things... in theory easy enough.

Kelly had been on the wrong side of the marik civil war, but so had a lot of people. Beau figured that he'd been luckier than most...the fact he was currently in command of the Regiment's Independent Fire Support BattleMech Company was plenty proof of that. Still, the boss wasn't here, and that left him back against the wall with the canopians, the azami liaison and comstar all wanting part of his time... never mind whoever else might want part of it today... and there was the fact he was himself ex FWLM.

The door way opened and let the two in.


Beau looked at both of them and started with his Canopian equivalent, since she was scrutinizing her note computer one handholding the stylus to the point her knuckles were white, "How bad is it Captain Short?"

"I don't know,"

It was an honest answer, but one that worried him more.

The Azami officer of the watch shifted. He wore SLDF khaki, the uniform of an SLDF regular which was normal. The tanker officer was however carrying a slung submachine gun despite them being in garrison and behind tanks and PBI from the Luxen Volunteers. Ordinarily he'd have been busy helping the Militia with their Marsden II tanks.

He shook his head mutely signally that this hadn't come through his chain of command... or if it had then the Azami elders hear on Luxen hadn't told him. That was a possibility that they hadn't told their own captain... Beau had gotten used to watching the elders just call the boss up directly... which wasn't much different than the normal way the canopians worked... or really any political system back home... it was about who you knew.

"Have we heard anything from ComStar?" he asked.

"Officially no," The Azami man answered. "I have heard however their complex is, buzzing." The robes were generally all about pretending the only thing they cared about was keeping the HPGs working and being neutral... but since the-, "It is possible there has been another atrocity." That there was some news fresh out of hyperspace still didn't mean it couldn't have been Canopian High Command, but they wouldn't know until they asked. "They have reduced traffic and increased security."

"Lets go see." Beau announced glancing between the two with a shrug and nonchalance that was mostly an act... "It could be good news after all."
Still gripping her stylus Short looked at him like he'd lost his mind, so he shrugged again. The Azami tanker glanced at his idle sketches of nesting arsenal ravens back home. The nesting birds building formidable redoubts against the snow. All stocked up with food and packed with material against the bitter cold. "I am preferential to Captain Chang's Clan Fox suggestion, myself." The tanker remarked.

"Yeah, a lot of people are," He wasn't opposed to Bubble's idea, certainly most the Azami seemed to hew towards her ideas of "I mean we engage in a lot of maneuver warfare, at least as much as we do for prepared defenses." It was a purely benign rivalry across the regiment, those involved in it mostly picked a mascot or talked about one strategy or the other in broad strokes... if anything "Its the guys outside the unit who take it more seriously."

"I've noticed that," Short remarked having eased her grip on the stylus as they walked down towards the ferrocrete blacktop of the spaceport, where aan open top jeep was waiting. "its reached popular media on Luxen with the company observers." There were still plenty of those even with the boss and most of the regiment off world.

"Yeah the Fed Suns, well Northwind talked about it." He remarked nodding to their driver, Beau catching the corporal's grin and buckling up as a precaution He was glad since just as soon as Short was aboard the driver gunned it and sped them past the Magistracy's contingent of Merlin Heavy BattleMechs towards where the Comstar HPG station was nestled.

Friar Tuck, their liaison on Luxen, was waiting with cold beer. The man was drinking already, but that wasn't anything unusual. The other robe to him had coffee, and spare hot coffee for Short and the treadhead. Tuck took a long pull from his beer, "The Precentor is still trying to find our boy, but well, we'll give them another couple of minutes, and see ourselves in."

"They don't know where the boss is?"

"Its nothing to worry about," Beau wasn't worried, "Just somewhere on the periphery without a station. I'm not worried."The MRB liaison stated before taking another drink... and a few minutes later they were lead in to a room with an active star chart of the rimward periphery.
.
"We couldn't locate Colonel Shepherd. He hasn't reachedanother station since the news came in..." The Precentor looked at Tuck, and then to Beauregard, "We've contacted Colonel Hammer, and Major MacKay with the latest."

"What about Soren and Septim," Bardiche was a whole Battalion of Mechs after all... whatever this was about... and Tuck glanced at him. "What?"

"Bardiche, under Colonel Holmgren is currently engaged in action. They're fighting as we speak on Farandir," The company liaison stated, "The fighting is heavy."

There was a cough from the precentor, "As for the other Light Horse Regiment," He choked slightly, "Force Major King reported receipt, but that Colonel Bey wanted orders from Colonel Shepherd directly." And that was the indication that this was worse than just Bardiche had had things drop into the pot.

Beau felt his mouth dry, "What are we looking at?"

The other precentor in the room, the man who had been silent up until this point looked him dead in the face and then looked at the floor. Then in a quiet voice, "Leviathan's mass driver is operational." He remarked before looking up to the Precentor Luxen, but Beau caught the Azami officer's expression change in his periphery, "It was used against one of our sister stations they were able to broadcast the message to us as the beast made orbit and fired." When the Precentor Luxen didn't take the hint, "We haven't informed the planetary government yet." He took a breath, "Show them the footage Precentor Luxen."

Davion Interlude
The past weeks had been exhausting. The galaxy, the Inner Sphere never stopped moving. The ComStar enclave on New Avalon demonstrated that just by existing... with it all out in the open.

Displays flashed. They showed BattleMechs. They showed news clips. Headlines and battles across the Inner Sphere, and from the Periphery. The Precentor New Avalon had invited her to the ComStar station at her best possible time. The ComStar adept who'd delivered it had been on the verge of panic despite Vandal's choice of phrase. He'd picked words to avoid precisely the sort of panic the functionary's body language gave away. Even if he hadn't, Yvonne would have gone as soon as possible.

In the past few years Comstar had made live transmissions, conference calls, more available. That meant being able to have information straight away... and it also meant people knew things. Yvonne had felt, therefore, it necessary to bring Alexandria along since it had seemed likely this Involve Shepherd... and most of Alexandria's time had been cataloging the changes and expansion of the Company its rearmament from SLDF caches in particular were of importance.

Not that they could talk about it while they waited.

Vandal who was currently talking with his own coterie of subordinates didn't seem to have a problem with her presence but he was clearly swamped. He moved abruptly and nodded to the countess of Kestrel, "I wish this was something of a more social nature," He remarked, "As a courtesy the order is waiting to release the footage until; after we've informed all of the member states." The Precentor gestured to hallway, which lead to an amphitheatre with holoprojector set up, where they waited for another few minutes in silence.

The footage... when it was shared... was more awful all the more awful for the lack of sound. The precentor of the station had relayed the Rim world Wwarship reaching orbit, recording all emission data and details that he could in hopes it might convey some advantage. That was all they could do... they had no hope of stopping the warship.

The PNA's face was set in a resolved grave expression. "The first circuit is returning to Terra," Meaning he would be leaving New Avalon, "we already needed to face selection of new members for the Combine," He paused, "And I don't want to speculate how they're handling this news but the MRB is being furnished funds to do everything they can to try and stop this threat... this monster Bauman has turned loose."

Yvonne nodded... but a small voice noted that ComStar raised the smuggler's bounty to 50M C-bills before Shepherd's conference call that Bauman had located derelict warships. That detail wasn't germane at the moment. "But the Combine has been informed?"
Huthrin Vandal nodded, "I only know that the Primus ultimately decided to inform the coordinator personally, an HPG call from Hilton Head on Terra." In short that Coordinator had likely been invited to the HPG station... Takashi had probably been thrilled given everything going on. She wondered from there if Florimel Kurita had been present... and then there was the tone that almost suggested the Precentor New Avalon seemed almost to be wishing he'd been the one to deliver the news. "The Prime hopes the First Circuit can broker and agreement between the great houses... a negotiated peace to end the third succession war in light of this crisis."

Peace, She thought of the Archon's rather still recent peace proposal and its lack of reception ... but the Archon had made the outreach before this. "You spoke of the MRB?"
Huthrin blew out a breath, "Shepherd may still find a way out of this... I'm searching for any mercenary companies with an emphasis on airpower. Anything that could potentially give us even slim odds," But the 588th ASF regiment Shepherd had filed paper work for was divided and spread out across who knew how many light years and, then with optimism, "I'm hoping that if he can kill Kelly it'll weaken the pirate's resolve."


She understood that, Kelly was the voice for rallying the Amaris cause. The agitator for that insanity, "What aren't you telling me yet?" Yvonne pressed knowing that there had to be more.

Vandal sighed, "Black Jack McGirk has purportedly taken command of the RWS Queen Anne's Revenge which is the Pinto-class. We believe that he's making a pivot into the capellan confederation, but he could easily jump the border. The Order is doing what it can to help, but" A pause a shake of his head... and Yvonne was all too aware of the realities of how porous the borders of interstellar polities were, "We can't know for certain his intentions but," He let the words hang and the knowledge of what Black Jack's actions, his maneuvers of late implied enough, "We believe from the latest information he's concentrated his forces... gathered up his old stalwarts. He may be making a push."

That had the potential to be bad news even without the warship.

She wondered the source of the information... how Vandal had come by it, but maybe Kelly had paid Mcgirk split the prize with the warship. McGirk seemed unenthusiastic about this Neo Amaris Empire business his recent allies had taken to. Nothing that the DMI had been able to gather had ever suggested those kinds of sympathies...his grievances his vendetta had always been directed against ComStar. It had been Kelly who'd brought the Amaris pretender to the fore but too late for the Wolf dragoons to leave and go wherever in order to rearm. They, the dragoons had sent Kerensky... who had to bein the periphery already. The FWL, House Marik, had given their blessing to the knights of St Cameron. Shepherd had confirmed that the 05P had assets of their own in play in the periphery. "Shepherd at least thinks he has a lead on Kelly." Of course Huthrin knew that, as he'd been right there beside her during the conference.
There hungriness to the PNA at the prospect. He'd made that plain moments earlier, reiterated. There was more there than she knew...but it wasn't something they could confront now. Kelly had used Bauman's efforts to to revive the specter of the age of war and the devastation of the 1st​ succession war. She wondered whether the combine would try and make a bold move. It was unclear exactly what resources they really had available. The league and the Capellans had, she accepted, needed to be told but being far nearer she expected both to hope to swoop in at the prospect of LosTech and they couldn't ignore warships.


Even during the conference that had been obvious. Shepherd sharing a look with the crippled O5P operative had made clear if Kelly or Bauman dug anything else up that he'd be in touch, "He thinks there are other depots, possibly caches," of WMDs "like on Brinton... maybe warships as well." Yvonne's thoughts turned to Triptiz floating derelict. "Another Brinton would be a disaster."


An hour after they'd returned, long enough for an evening meal to be prepared Yvonne sat down. She was still drafting what she would recommend Hanse consider doing... but the first prince at least had the latest update. The problem was the suggestion that ComSTar would begin to push its own version of a peace proposal. That was a warning since it suggested that the Primus was likely to try and talk peace...
That was a problem. Yvonne already had had a tendency to think of the Capellan March as a weak area of Davion security. That the AFFS was already preparing for a protracted front against the Combine especially given the Combine sending the Arkab legion against the League had allowed them to open on the wider frontage.

She decided to change subjects, put the pen down and glanced to her lady in waiting. "There is going to be a great deal to go over."