Battletech: The Ghost Who Walks (Battletech Isekai)

[Imperator Pax]

Nemo me impune lacessit.

Put simply, the Clanners have done poked the bear. The bear took offense at this.

Click to shrink...

Yeah, like Campbell means well on the notion of he's genuinely interested in reconnecting with Kerensky's descedants, or at least those descended from the Black Watch... but uhm yeah Bloodname Hazen is Clan Jade Falcon, and well schmitt is Blood Spirit

and well the problem with the wolf dragoons attack in force is that the people they're fighting are fighting along SLDF doctrine with comparable equipment, in precisely the kind of grinding aggression that favors a numerically superior force.

and well then there is the duel, and how zeta's command reacts to losing a one one one fight, which is to say not well

 

[Fragment of Serenity]

Yeah, like Campbell means well on the notion of he's genuinely interested in reconnecting with Kerensky's descedants, or at least those descended from the Black Watch... but uhm yeah Bloodname Hazen is Clan Jade Falcon, and well schmitt is Blood Spirit

and well the problem with the wolf dragoons attack in force is that the people they're fighting are fighting along SLDF doctrine with comparable equipment, in precisely the kind of grinding aggression that favors a numerically superior force.

and well then there is the duel, and how zeta's command reacts to losing a one one one fight, which is to say not well

Click to shrink...

Add to that the Gauss rifles, Alacorns, pre-prepped tank and artillery's positions, the fact that you made a bunch of drunken scottsmen get up at the ass crack of dawn, and... well, the IS's current experts in the 'fuck around and find out department' and you almost, kinda, have to feel bad for the poor Dragoons.

 

[Imperator Pax]

Scrap Highland Faire Alternate​

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

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

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

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

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

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

but for the time being there were other matters.

The Devastator stepped out into the morning air.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Minutes ticked by.

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

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

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

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

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

"Data suggests the machine is stock."

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

The vaguely dinosaur like heads exploded as gauss rifles roared.

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

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

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

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

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

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

Then everything went wrong, and right.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

"There is still work to be done."

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

 

[Fragment of Serenity]

Man... Kerston just called them cowards.

More or less straight up. To their faces.

And he's RIGHT.

DISHONOR ON EVERYONE.

 

[kioras]

Yeah, I call bull shit on hearing about Kentares until at least the tail end of the Golden Century.

It sounds like making shit up to make themselves sound better.

 

[Imperator Pax]

Yeah, I call bull shit on hearing about Kentares until at least the tail end of the Golden Century.

It sounds like making shit up to make themselves sound better.

Click to shrink...

Very likely, and also given how revisionist clan history is, they'd have to explain or contend with the civil war between the sldf in exile i.e. stuff like operation klondike which uh... would lead to questions about this whole clan stuff and Nicky Kerensky being great khan

Like the SLDF in exile apparently knew about the outbreak of the 1st succession war... from like rim world remnants (somehow, i guess they might have been running from the lyran conquest, I'd have to check the book) but Kentares which is relatively important to this story didn't broadcast to the inner sphere until 2797... and it bears mentioning that while I'm not sure canonically House Cunningham is either descended directly from McKinnon's raiders (i.e. Fox's teeth) or intermarried with them after. So coming out and going 'oh yeah we heard about that, and we didn't want to be involved' isn't the best look

... especially since the Eridani's whole shtick is star league honor and to the ideal of the league coupled with Kerston's command has just suffered pretty serious losses to a sudden invasion.

 

[Sogen]

I'm honestly surprised by the attempted assassination at the end of the duel, that's a pretty severe breach of Zellbrigen. If Gene hadn't killed those pilots Natasha may very well have done so herself with her bare hands for the stain upon her honor.

 

[Imperator Pax]

I'm honestly surprised by the attempted assassination at the end of the duel, that's a pretty severe breach of Zellbrigen. If Gene hadn't killed those pilots Natasha may very well have done so herself with her bare hands for the stain upon her honor.

Click to shrink...

Oh certainly Natasha is probably livid, but per sarna from FM Mercs on Zeta:

They are also known to flush out an enemy commander's 'Mech by engaging in one-on-one combat, then switching to mass concentrated fire, demoralizing enemy forces by removing their leadership from the field.
-Field Manual: Mercenaries, p. 104

Click to shrink...

And just after that apparently then it decides to remind me that Zeta didn't start doing combined arms until later or that Jamison shouldn't be in charge yet thats what I get for not double checking my notes... whoops. Either way Kerensky would be pissed because Zeta jumped the gun

 

[Silverbullet]

That'd just lead to Zeta's word being worthless and I personally would make it a mission to call all the arty and airstrikes I could on them. That's like faking a surrender, you don't do that.

 

[Imperator Pax]

That'd just lead to Zeta's word being worthless and I personally would make it a mission to call all the arty and airstrikes I could on them. That's like faking a surrender, you don't do that.

Click to shrink...

Especially in as semi ritualized a society as the third succession wars. But you know canonically the wolf dragoons are the author's pets.

Like here, yes, Gene already artillery on standby in case something went screwby, but he also had superior numbers... but Jamison, or whoever in Zeta gave that order would very likely be in trouble( especially Jamison is supposed to be relatively hidebound by clan traditions) since while not straight zellbringen ritual, Gene effectively offered a proto-batchall in the form of the challenge Hegemony offered to Combine Ronin, and we're told that Clan Zellbringen emerged from Combine dueling traditions.

 

[Imperator Pax]

Primary (Main) Timeline: January 3018​

Highland Faire 10
(A)​

He leaned on the console, the excitement was starting to lapse into the beginning of fatigue. It didn't help that there was a significant amount of historical data, of recordings of the last days of the hegemony that kept him from sleeping. Gene knew he was fighting back a yawn, but the old man didn't seem to notice it from his end of the feed. "And you've confirmed it Pasha?"

"Indeed commander Shepherd. The Azami and Rasalahgue vessels all check out." Gene sat back in the chair as the telemetry from Colorado resolved and confirmed the DropShips detaching. Pasha at least had the advantage of being opposite, "I have received repeated and distinct confirmation."

"Alright, let me know if something changes." The line dropped, and he wheeled slightly, bringing the chair to face the Davions, "What do you think?"

A couple of the Guards Staff always floating close to The field Marshal during meetings looked birdlike as they froze before one of them answers, "The Rasalhague resistance group is the Sword of Tyr."

"That means nothing to me, sorry." He picked up the thermos of coffee, "Why are they here? How are they here?" JumpShips had limitations. Anyone coming here would have had to have route plotted... and an Azami presence was one thing, but he was a little leery of of more than that.

"They may have stolen a number of 'Mechs from the combine before they headed this way." A guards officer admitted looking a little sheepish at having spoken out of turn.

Gene was cognizant of the hand on the back of his chair. The fact that The clan elders very much wanted a meeting of their own... and the fact that Field Marshal Davion had if he had counted right two Davion regular RCT, and two SLDF Mercenary Teams readied if this went sideways. He reached to the side and opened the long office style case drawer and started rifling through the fields, then offered it behind him, "New Avalon Packet. I'm about to start passing out briefing materials to the DMM officers as a follow up to the Marauders."

"Now?"

"Now." He replied "I was going to give them a day or two to read the briefing for the Marauders but I want them with hands on training in the morning."

Field Marshal Davion coughed slightly drawing his attention away from the countess, "I would very much commend the initiative, but if this is not the crisis we thought it might be, it bears remarking that the squires tournament is going to open the day after. Attendance is expected. Even if they wanted to do a High Gee burn we would still have days." She paused, "This is not how I would have preferred certain introductions to be made, but it is what it is."

her assessment wasn't quite accurate. If they had wanted to, they could have burned hard from the Jump Point and ... well it wasn't the Star League any more and few people were going to be that reckless with expensive military equipment that was much harder to replace. They didn't need to worry about the situation. "Is there that needs to be done?"

"No Colonel, the current readiness can remain elevated," The DMM troops that had been scrambled to their mechs could stay where they were. The Field Marshal checked her watch, "until they would change over. It would be best for everyone if the faire went on as normal."

The troops were in the field in their mechs spread across a moorland on the far side of the star port, the comparative higher elevation of both the castle itself and the mountain pass and the rocky river valley were presumably protected by Northwind militia. Most of his pilots though had been scrambled to fill liaison slots with the mechwarriors they'd been involved in training on Robinson.

Yvonne Davion excused herself leaving with a portion of her staff, which left him there with Kerston and his counterpart of the Blue Star Irregulars. "So at least we're not being invaded."

"Right," He replied to Campbell already reading the situation. "How is this going to effect things?"

Campbell glanced to one of faire's officials, "They're late, no denying that," he paused, and the other man nodded, "I admit its not unheard of for that," But apparently, certainly not for this much metal... "But they've got merchant, and competitor tickets, and pledges for good conduct, you trust your JumpShip captain." It was not a question.

"I trust that Pasha is telling the truth about trusting what he's been told."

"Then we see their kid does in the squire's tournament then." He was a little surprised that they were going to let whoever the new arrivals had to compete just like that but... then again he really didn't know what to make about all of this... and of course, "But, I really think Colonel that this scare behind us, we ought to go ahead and take time to sit down with the clans."

Which was not necessarily what Alexandria wanted to hear, but it was certainly a meeting she was not invited to, was not going to be privy to.... and certainly with everything going on she knew something was going on. Whether the countess of Kestrel didn't like it or not she didn't really have much of a choice. Frankly he doubted that if it came right down to it... that even the Field Marshal really would have tried too hard to get involved. "Let me get with Abner, I trust that your presbyters aren't going to object to what needs to be done?"

"No," It came out more like neigh, "Go on ahead with it... given what's been talked about I can't see them complaining." If I.E.'s diggers had expected a simple vacation they were about to have that hope spoiled.

"Are you going to call them back?"

He hummed, and then smiled, "Recall them, no, We're on a clock, they need all the training they can get." He hit the switch on the console pairing to the radio, "Hanzo, run them through gunnery drills on the south field." He received an affirmative over the channel, and could almost hear the groans from the Robinson cadets, and probably the alumni too.

"Are you going to put him in one of those things?"

"He's gotten comfortable in the Cicada, truthfully I think he'll do well in one of the ones carrying SRMs, but we will see. I may move him to the Catapult."

There was a pause, "Yeah, I seen it sitting there."

"From the specs its almost like your Black Horse." Kerston remarked entering the conversation. In more ways than he knew. It had taken them time to fill it out but because it was ten tons lighter it used a light engine and outfitted much of the same equipment and that included recovered DHS from League era stockpiles... it was

"You could think of it that way, or as a product improved model of the K2. Its capable of Jumping like a standard catapult, and carries SRM-2, and a salvaged pulse laser that we sourced from an Azami merchant."

"I thought that's what it had went in," Bard remarked. "its sounds like a nasty surprise, but what was the point?"

"I suppose there wasn't one. It wasn't the original plan," Far from it, originally the plan had been to turn the repaired K2 back to a standard catapul or near enough, but they had had down time for the techs, and they had spare parts... and they had wanted to test out and work with the Dalban systems that had gone into the Catapult.

... but there had been no one to pilot it... and since there was LosTech in the machine he'd been convinced it was probably a bad idea to stick any new recruit into the machine. That didn't include Mister Ishida, but he'd been happy with the Cicada, and Chang had moved to the Atlas at his request ... Bo was out the big Free Worlder's skill was needed in a missile boat.
--
As he had expected Alexandria hadn't been invited to join them... if anything the guards at the door waiting to escort them to the meeting had been rather loathe to even allow Kerston to come along... they had accepted it as just part of the day.

Unlike the Stuart tartans common to the other men the room, a grizzled one eyed man wore a sword pin on his sash denoting that in addition to the, dark blue and green, black watch tartan he wore he was intended to be identified as knight commander of the Star League's Order of the Sword. If it wasn't an original then the burnished and worn metal had still seen a lot in its lifetime... and given among other things the display case holding the burned remains of the left hand of an HGN 732b, he assumed it was original. There were other artifacts from the Star League, and from before dating back to wars on Terra before spaceflight had been common.

Introductions passed around, and Gene was surprised that for their Scottish flavoring Northwind great clans included Welsh, and Irish surnames among the council ranks. William George, and Richard O'Connell stood side by side in tartan dress along the MacKenzies and Sinclairs.

All of them made clear who at least chaired this meeting, if not necessarily all of them. What more than anything though that dominated the meeting was the prospect of getting into the door that had been locked to them, and atl east confirming with their own eyes. He was sure that they had probably spent many sleepless hours pouring over the documents that Colonel Schmitt had left behind.

There was no question that they were loyal to the dream of the Hegemony, and the Star League at least as much as Kerston was. Kerston was here, but his counterpart from the Blue Star Irregulars had been left at the doors of the great hall with the countess of Kestrel... and they were about to leave them further behind... because their next stop was a secure underground tram to take them to access the the CID annex where Dante was waiting.

Gene carefully navigated around the skittering spider like drones that were now active in order to access the panel. "Is there something going on?"

"Merely taking precautions colonel."

Each of the anti personnel drones in addition to vibroblade forlimb for melee... because someone had thought that was a good idea... also carried Mauser laser pulse rifles that had at the end been standard to HAF Special Operations Forces... though carried was probably a misnomer given that they were mounted into the machines. This was nothing, these were anti personnel drones, not the ones intended to actual impede light vehicles until GCV drones could arrive on station.

The intention had been that any force assault from the outside trying to force their way into a castle would block the entry ways with bodies. It didn't work out as well for the defenders if they had been ordered to allow the attackers into the castle gorunds before hand and not have the defenses ready to protect it, or if they'd had significant troops stripped from their posts before the fighting started.

"You've proof then that Minoru Kurita was more than just a covetous bastard?" Old One Eye asked stepping forward to press a hand and an ID chit that ran against the data and blood sample. It authenticated nothing unexpected, that he was a survivor, the descendant at least, of the Black Watch lineage.

The question was unnecessary, Gene had no doubt that Dante had potentially been salivating, or near enough for a machine to play the footage, to bring additional resources in that might be able to carry out orders from a royal command, or at the very at least ascertain things so that if there wasn't a Cameronian fleet waiting, that they could redirect efforts instead to striking back at the combine in full. They were certainly going to get to the latter... to the issue of Tripitz... and the Cameron children.
--
Notes: This is part A, and if you remember earlier someone asked what if Gene were Ian Cameron the younger we're still not doing that. That would be very messy and complicate the timeline even more than it already potentially is. I keep waffling on whether to include explicitly MW5 events since to the best of my knowledge it hasn't been codified, but this story does heavily involve Interstellar Expeditions and frankly its interesting that Mason came in and infiltrated DC space ahead of the wolf dragoons and that raises potential lore questions, especially given his choice to bring a Nightstar.... well we will see but there maybe oblique references that can hint at MW5 potentially being true in the background.

Just to reiterate, this part is mainline canon / primary timeline for Ghost Who Walks. Its fun for me to delve into alternate branches and gives me something to do on the side but this and part b and the following on will likely be primary timeline through the end of the year.

 

[Imperator Pax]

Notes:
Just a reminder:​

The expanded version of the Luxen Contracts is up here: https://forum.questionablequesting.com/threads/battletech-the-second-luxen-contracts.17159/ this is an expansion of the post IE Luxen stint its not done yet with pioche coming up and then after that BlackJack's pirates attack Luxen.

Additionally​

Besides that the most likely next noncanon content will since its being a bugbear likely be something involving Helm. I'm not going to say much more than that since its probably going to be set in 3023 (thats still in the air) but it will involve the Eridani, and Blue Stars and will be similar in scope to how the Highland Faire Dragoons branch was set up.

However that won't effect the next prime timeline update on the twenty fifth Highland Faire 10b will go up then.

 

[Imperator Pax]

Highland Faire 10
(B)​

Gene had allowed himself to lean on the console he'd taken a seat at, Dante didn't have coffee unfortunately. None of this information was 'new' in the sense that he hadn't had access to but Dante was an AI the material he was sorting through after playing all the request footage was still a lot of data. He had no idea whether the children of the Star Lord had made it out...

... and even if they could get a recovery team down into the gravity well, which was a big if it assumed that there was data in the computer. The damage to the Tripitz certainly looked like she'd suffered a misjump, but the question was more about the details. Had Tripitz been scuttled by its crew after whatever had happened? They didn't know that. What was the damage caused by the the ASF that had pushed into the gravity well? Severe, but how severe... would they be able to recover drive data, or other data from computers aboard?

If they could they might be able to backtrack to wherever the Tripitz had come from, or move forward looking for the next stop out into the black. There were a lot of questions, there was a lot of information that they were just short on. They were going to need specialized resources. Including ability to authenticate and access any survivor shadow network of HPGs and memory systems, and that would be complicated in itself if their defense systems were still operational.

That was still a significant if, a lot of significant ifs really. They would need time they would need resources Just figuring out those questions would require significant pre planning and the truth was there was only one outfit set up to go on such a snipe hunt. They were also going to need to provide security. The information suggested that the Taurians and Capellans had both rushed to try and salvage and through one of them or some other third party the 'vandenburg white wings' had learned of and appeared... if they started doing any kind of work then they were going to get questions just from nosy people.

Nosy people and expensive toys tended to attract pirates as well... and these operations would be largely out in the black so MechWarriors weren't going to have a whole lot to do.

The Terminal chimed as Dante finished the calculations... it would really would have been more appropriate to call them speculation. Which was why tehy weren't just straight out telling the others... because

... of course given the timing... it was also possible that ... due to the vagaries of hyperspace, of how the jumpdrive and how unclear some of its physics were that the Tripitz's misjump had caused it to be held in hyperspace.

It was an astronomical chance... but it was a possibility given that Tripitz hadn't been discovered sooner... and they needed an explanation for that. As a Black Lion-class Battlecruiser given its location Kerensky's expeditionary force of the SLDF suppressing the territorial states insurrection should have found and recovered it... so why hadn't they. Triptiz should have been equipped with a mobile HPG and should have been able to broadcast a signal through the SLCOMNET and also the Shadow Net used by Royal Command ... help should have come.

... but the chaos of the New Vandenburg Revolt simply made details opaque. They didn't know enough and they would have needed access to the navy's side of the logs to even begin to guess which ships had been where. They needed more than that... Dante had been cut off from the HPG network for longer than Tristan, and Tristan wouldn't have been slated to receive materiel of that nature... or regarding evacuation. There would be details in area commands, there should have been clandestine stations that had at least some of the details on what all Hegemony provinces had tucked away but those would likely require an AI to sift through the data and would still probably be so much data that finding one would potentially take searching by hand to confirm if a cache or depot hadn't been picked over by someone in the intervening centuries.

So much to do... and much of it the sort of work that needed specialists and little to do with piloting a 'Mech.
--
It was going to take Abner's diggers probably a couple of days, but at least they had gotten started. Being safe more than that, but they could have rushed if there had been actual threat of invasion... but it didn't seem like there was a reason to do that.

"What do we do now?"

"I think that's my question," Gene replied to Campbell, then shrugged. "Dieron first, we still have some time until we step off... and if these are Azami then their merchants could have stuff that might useful."

"More useful than whatever the Hegemony stored? There are assault mechs in the inventory, earmarked for the Royal Scotts Dragoons."

"I'm not going to turn down looking." Not when they were contending with invading another successor state. Looking was the least they could do to see if the digital inventory was in there. The Azami made a point of painstakingly digging through old scrapyards. Boneyards that had been ignored and forgotten about that in some cases had been left behind by the age of war. They looked through ruins, and battlefields. Even if that was a little macabre they never threw anything away... and that was why their techs were able to keep SLDF era machines running. ... but he also knew that going to talk shop, going to shop around at their wares would give him and pasha the chance to sit down with whatever elders were in charge of the caravan... and talk about getting them on the road out to the periphery... into the deep periphery to settle either at the Alamut colony or on some other Alexandrian covenant world that had been left behind. "The reality is if those documents are accurate, the loadout is designed for Hegemony units, and I don't have the manpower right now to make that useful."

There was a grunt, "What about that list of worlds you gave to Dante? You think they'll be useful?"

... it had been give and take and the truth was going back to Elidere would probably be necessary... more than necessary they needed a better idea of what the Combine side of the border had looked like... and of course while they couldn't go to earth Dante recommended a trip to each of the provincial capitals, and if possible the major worlds of the Terran Hegemony. It was a lot of potential stops on the map... and they were talking about planets, stopping to visit wasn't going to mean that they wouldn't come back later with more details and find something else.

... but one thing at a time and focused. "Yes, and I think it will help the Davion's keep the Combine off foot rather than allowing them to concentrate their forces near Terra." He'd recommend to the Field Marshal that they plan to liberate Galtor III citing the map to the SLDF depot on Eire; the planet's eastern continental landmass.

He had specifically asked for Dante to prioritize a list of worlds that both could be used to potentially benefit actions taken against the Combine, as well as well ones that would be viable given the more limited resources of the succession wars. They weren't the same thing. They were similar but not the same thing.

Working from Pasha's information Dante had calculated that groups like the Azami Liberation Front and others that weren't necessarily dedicated accelerationists potentially risked pushing an overstretched Combine towards increasing retaliatory atrocities ... beyond whatever the combine was currently perpetuating. The Combine hadn't exactly been the nicest place during the league but the last two centuries had certainly doubled down on all the worst traits it seemed. That was beyond their remit at this stage though

"Sorry that we don't have pilots to spare." He glanced to Campbell, "From the Academy I mean," Dante had already complained about the lack of ASF coverage ... but that really did go back to the Rim World invasion, but certainly much of the surviving at the time infrastructure had been blown up with the FedSuns invasion and the Federated Suns had never rebuilt.

The original plan had been to hire mercenary pilots, but they'd also taken hires from the Davion recommendations in part because of expedience, and to contend with Dieron. Gene wouldn't have agreed to that from the capellans... the more reports he saw about their servitor caste, even if it was coming from obviously biased davion sources the more pissed off he got... but the Combine was the threat directly in front of them for the time being. "Galax is only one jump from New Avalon," and it was home to the Federated Boeing operated Armstrong Flight Academy.

Yvonne had provided really two distinct rosters of recruits, the other list being drawn from Albion... "Do-" He stopped, and Gene turned.


And speaking of the Field Marshal she had entered the room. "You lads you look you've been up to trouble." She observed, with the countess of Kestrel following in behind. "I hope you found something useful?"

"We'll have to manually inventory it all." He replied. "Its not a Brian Cache."

"Well I'm here now lets have it, what did you find, and what has the bloody scotts all in a tizzy." There was no heat to the comment... at the same time he suspected that they might have preferred not immediately bringing Abner into it, but ... well Dante wasn't entirely sure that the port's ... assuming there were any still functional... drones would necessarily shoot at anyone without League compliant credentials. The IE industrial mechs, digging machines and earth movers would far less likely to be shot at by simple drones if there was a DOME IFF being broadcast... but they weren't going to advertise that.


He took a breath to collate the details of the reports Dante had flagged, "In the lead up to the Amaris coup, General Kerensky overruled local Terran commanders to permit Rim World troops to take up station on Hegemony worlds that had already been largely stripped of troops. This allowed the Rim World troops to largely bypass the killing grounds of Hegemony Castles Brian, like this one. The Hegemony looks to have blown some of the security bolts in access points, and the rim world bombardment against the defense cordons established by Hegemony force caused enough structural damage to collapse most of the rest. To that end, we can ascertain that there is a Port Complex that has DropShips, possibly even fully loaded ones, but certainly an entire port with war materiel that has been sealed since new years day," of 2767.

Dante wanted him to visit and ascertain the condition of New Dallas. If Volgadon was gone then the CID station at New Dallas was possibly the best hope for a facility to ascertain a master list of Hegemony caches for total war.... and New Dallas might also have access directives to secret fleet facilities and point them in the right direction in terms of the Rimward Periphery... one thing at a time. Dieron, and its fortress ... before them.

For the barest of moments he expected that the Field Marshal would complain about the Hegemony's naming conventions, classifications of facilities. Instead her focused jumped to the orders issued before the coup. "The documents colonel. Transcripts of the orders." Campbell lifted the satchel at request a little alarmed at the sudden back and forth.. and probably, obviously now that he thought about it, wondering how much they were going to tell the Field Marshal.

At the time, while obliviously imprudent, because Kerensky had had the legal command authority to issue those orders. He was protector of the Star League, and the former regent of House Cameron... but it certainly didn't look good.
--
Notes: Alright remaining end of year schedule.

Extras, both Arano content and Helm content are currently in the pipeline to round out the year in terms of extras. There is the possibility of previews of New Dallas and some Hegemony mad science projects as well, but I will be calling it that Highland Faire will resume probably on the eighth (that is in the new year) due to my travel schedule.

I may do (completely unrelated to BT) something Pokemon Scarlet and Violet's setting of Paldea (Space err Pokemon Iberian Penninsula) but that is still in drafting stages.

 

[HellTeddy]

Thank you for the update, and a Merry Christmas to you!

 

[Bofors40mm]

well looks like the new dallas core will be a thing then....and oh boy between that and the master cache list comstar will be so so "happy". Hanse on the other hand will need to consult the list of nice worlds needing a duke at this rate

 

[Imperator Pax]

House Arano Introduction Part 3
(a)​

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


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

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

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

The door chimed. "Enter." He ordered.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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


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

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

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

"There you are."

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

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

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

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

 

[Centergg]

I like this story. There is moments hard to read because of timeskips but as whole it's okay story

Remembering CYOA at the start I am still waiting for Aaron Sandoval to demonstrate his telepathy or for some character to reveal what they are actually shape-shifting Wolf

 

[Imperator Pax]

I like this story. There is moments hard to read because of timeskips but as whole it's okay story

Remembering CYOA at the start I am still waiting for Aaron Sandoval to demonstrate his telepathy or for some character to reveal what they are actually shape-shifting Wolf

Click to shrink...

Lord Aaron's family are the only ones who know about his telepathy, and Focht won't show up for a few years, but the nominal reveal of Sandoval having telepathy will be during the Battle of Robinson where the Combine is attacking.]

As for the time skips I'm trying at least with the main story to avoid doing major time skips outside of just BT 'slow' travel times but I do admit that it is a weakness narratively

 

[Centergg]

Lord Aaron's family are the only ones who know about his telepathy, and Focht won't show up for a few years, but the nominal reveal of Sandoval having telepathy will be during the Battle of Robinson where the Combine is attacking.]

As for the time skips I'm trying at least with the main story to avoid doing major time skips outside of just BT 'slow' travel times but I do admit that it is a weakness narratively

Click to shrink...

Because I am reading "Frederick Steiner and the man who knew too little " I wonder if Focht has used his new POWAH! and accidentally has found the true nature of Aldo Lestrangw and currently are going into spiritual discovery quest-trip, while thinking about his life

 

[Imperator Pax]

[Nominally canon, 3019 Branch]​

House Arano Introduction
Part 3 (b)​

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

 

[RoyalTwinFangs]

"Leaving aside that and of course it much justifying a moniker as the walking death,"

Click to shrink...

I like that moniker. Will it be part of the regular story?

 

[Imperator Pax]

I like that moniker. Will it be part of the regular story?

Click to shrink...

I thought Bard had already mentioned that, but yes, its from the main story

"The Walking death" 'it was only little different, a translation of a translation, of 'the Ghost who Walks'.

Click to shrink...

- from later in Northwind

 

[Silverbullet]

…ComStar has to be nervous about Gene but at the same time he's a windfall in their current on going fuck up. McGirk is waging, successfully, a war against ComStar and they can't respond in their usual way or even their panic button of active Warships. After all, what if the inexperienced ROM crew on the Warship get overwhelmed and boarded by pirates? Using Mercenaries, as many as they can and offering lost tech mechs as sweeteners to dispossessed could get the army they need and a bit of training and organizing and the ComStar Guard and Militia the shot in the arm it needs.

I would however suggest a cast list so we can know who's who.

 

[Imperator Pax]

…ComStar has to be nervous about Gene but at the same time he's a windfall in their current on going fuck up. McGirk is waging, successfully, a war against ComStar and they can't respond in their usual way or even their panic button of active Warships. After all, what if the inexperienced ROM crew on the Warship get overwhelmed and boarded by pirates? Using Mercenaries, as many as they can and offering lost tech mechs as sweeteners to dispossessed could get the army they need and a bit of training and organizing and the ComStar Guard and Militia the shot in the arm it needs.

I would however suggest a cast list so we can know who's who.

Click to shrink...

Yes.

I almost typed Vandal Savage instead of Huthrin Vandal, who is Precentor New Avalon, is basically acting on his own recognizance, but with the consent of most of the 'Fed Suns precentors' on the basis of it has gotten this bad (and also because ComStar hasn't punished the Combine sufficently for their shennanigans) at the moment ComStar's perspective is 'oh its just stuff they're digging out of the ground', and while thats not great the FedSuns are whaling on the Combine (and this is before Steiner-Davion peace talks, the Archon has yet to propose her canonical we should discuss peace in the inner sphere)

Black Jack is making is a point of crippling the HPG network in the periphery, which isn't great to b egin with which will have other repercussions later on. The ComsGuard really should have started recruiting, hell should have started building up after the Triptiz affair in canon but certainly when they realized that the Jolly Roger affair went so damn sideways and here yes risking warships? Yeah, the First Circuit is presently deadlocked and too unwilling to risk losing them and for good reason.

Spoiler: Non Canon

So even though the Erineyes (a Mass Driver equipped Faslane) doesn't exist one idea I had was of Black Jack aquiring a Rim World Republic equivalent and using it to threaten some planets in the Rimward periphery (probably either Taurian or Canopian) and that being the conclusion of the Black Jack arc with the question then becoming, 'where the fuck did this asshole get a warship' to set up for Stefan's descedants and also other warships in the future earlier

and yes, to reiterate cast and crew / dramatis personae should have gone up- a while ago that was an oversight on my part

 

[Silverbullet]

Any HPG loss is crippling given ComStars inability to mass produce the components. I'm just wondering why we aren't seeing more merc outfits being hired in the Rimward Periphery because this has got to be making Canopus and the Bulls nervous. Another Periphery Realms Capital just got invaded and to the Taurians a Taurian planet just had its population enslaved. (Nevermind the dispute between the Aurigans and Taurians on whose planet it was.)

 

[Bofors40mm]

Honestly at this point comstar should basically be hiring as many aerospace focused merc units to kill Black Jack/render him immobile on a strategic scale as possible. Because well if nothing else I doubt the ass got the Comguard's ASFs or most of their dropships or any of the jumpships so clip his mobility and...
Also they could probably get the great houses focused on killing the ass via offering the use of the yards of Sol(well really the yards over Luna) for refitting their jumpship for a decade to whoever puts Black Jack in the ground. Or something like that.
That being said there is one silver lining for comstar in all of this. They can probably openly roll out the comguards way way earlier since they certainly have a excuse as to why they need them

 

[Imperator Pax]

Dramatis Personae
[Pending Updates]​

[I'll add some more later, and build from there over time]

Severus 'Septim' Alexander
Nationality: Lyran Commonwealth
Mech: Merlin, Merlin Cavalry
A veteran of the Lyran Guards, working under an assumed name this scion of minor Lyran nobility comes from a well to do family but is plagued by prophetic visions of future battles often dominated by various totem animals. His father is on an appropriations committee within the lower chamber of the Lyran government

Gladys 'Bubbles' Chang
Nationality: Capellan
Mech: Hunchback, Atlas-Samsonov
Chang is a veteran of a larger Detroit based Merc unit the Iron Dragons who left due to changes in leadership, looking to stretch her wings, make a name, and ultimately do the right thing and have a good time while doing it, an accomplished urban brawler her Hunchback is a good fit for her piloting style. Has a younger sister serving in the red lancers back home.

Beauregard Alexander
Nationality: Free Worlds League
Mech Dervish
A native of Atreus Beau is a large man he was a veteran of the now disbanded 3rd Marik Militia having only entered the mercenary profession, registering with the MRB, on his arrival on Detroit in 3015.

'Hanzo' Ishida
Nationality: Combine descended periphery native.
Mech: Cicada Variant (c.3018)
A man of few words, and one betrayed by the Combine mission to pursue the Azami. He has a deep interest in the study of bushido and its various incarnations of political thought.

Professor Abner
Nationality Lyran
Mech: Atlas II
A jolly old soul 'Lord William' or Professor Abner is a wealthy and eccentric Lyran noble enjoying his retirement years adventuring and exporing his true passion LosTech prospecting, and seeking answers to great mysteries of the succession wars. Has a number of legitimate and illegitimate children, very well connected.

--
[Forthcoming]

Naval Assets: The JumpShips
--
Maguanac Corp
Armor, and Support Personnel of the Sam Houston

--
Hammer
Mechanized Infantry and Tankers recruited from Detroit

--
Claymore
Lieutenant Colonel Angus MacIntyre
Nationality: Northwind (Federated Suns)
Mech: Highlander
Previously a senior NMA Instructor MacIntyre is a heavyset man familiar with the political conditions of both sides of the Capellan March. He generally recommends attacking hard and fast and not trusting the enemy to abide by any social niceties .

Major Julius 'Root' MacKay
Nationality: Northwind (Federated Suns)
Mech: Highlander
The XO of Claymore Battalion and previously an instructor at the Northwind Military Academy. A foil to his commanding officer Root's call sign reflects his preference as a defensively oriented preferring to anchor a defensive line and use the assault and heavy mechs comprising his lance to break the enemy at range.

 

[Imperator Pax]

Honestly at this point comstar should basically be hiring as many aerospace focused merc units to kill Black Jack/render him immobile on a strategic scale as possible. Because well if nothing else I doubt the ass got the Comguard's ASFs or most of their dropships or any of the jumpships so clip his mobility and...
Also they could probably get the great houses focused on killing the ass via offering the use of the yards of Sol(well really the yards over Luna) for refitting their jumpship for a decade to whoever puts Black Jack in the ground. Or something like that.
That being said there is one silver lining for comstar in all of this. They can probably openly roll out the comguards way way earlier since they certainly have a excuse as to why they need them

Click to shrink...

Yeah, I didn't consider the Luna yards bribe, but yes, ComStar has plenty of excuse for why it needs the ComsGuards without any underhanded shenanigans and that's without the Combine getting pissed off at the Fed Suns in the near future [such that the Comsguard will publicly debut earlier than in canon]

 

[Bofors40mm]

Yeah, I didn't consider the Luna yards bribe, but yes, ComStar has plenty of excuse for why it needs the ComsGuards without any underhanded shenanigans and that's without the Combine getting pissed off at the Fed Suns in the near future [such that the Comsguard will publicly debut earlier than in canon]

Click to shrink...

Honestly comstar has enough possible bribes with the industrial base of Terra they openly keep operational to basically get the great houses to stop fighting each other on a widescale basis so for a bit and go focus on murdering the loot box er I mean Black Jack.

 

[Imperator Pax]

Any HPG loss is crippling given ComStars inability to mass produce the components. I'm just wondering why we aren't seeing more merc outfits being hired in the Rimward Periphery because this has got to be making Canopus and the Bulls nervous. Another Periphery Realms Capital just got invaded and to the Taurians a Taurian planet just had its population enslaved. (Nevermind the dispute between the Aurigans and Taurians on whose planet it was.)

Click to shrink...

I could have sworn I replied this.

Ok since I didn't apparently, this is true, part of this is of course in unreliable narrator, because yes both the Canopians and Taurians want more mercs in this scenario, Aea has only just recently happened and involved her HPG getting stomped on so word has not fully spread yet to the respective capitals and certainly at this point in this branch timeline the attack on Cormordir (or its repulse) has not, but Ana Marie very much would prefer it Shepherd's company come back to the Magistracy to run security as soon as they're avialble, and probably try and poach Markham's Marauders battalion equally as quickly [During the Pirate Wars arc, Detroit, Herotitus and elsewhere are very brisque business going on]

This will also be the arc where potentially among other things like Fjaldr will be worlds like Taragona, as well dealing with Grim Sybil and potentially going to Artu early (though that latter one is definitely up in the air)