Battletech: The Ghost Who Walks (Battletech Isekai)

EXTRAS
The First Prince ft Dr Banzi​

New Avalon September 3017

The protected transit had taken them south of the capital where what had been christened the New Avalon Institute of Science had been erected, "What am I looking at doctor?" As far as the prince could tell it was just an animated spiral.

"DNA molecules, your highness." The frazzled looking man replied. He gave a sudden cheeky grin and tapped the keys with a rapid series of loud clacks as a result, "And an anomaly. You have to appreciate people who actually tell their doctors the truth.... well I'm getting ahead of myself." The image sort of changed, the base was similar but not identical "This is Miss Kerensky's blood sample, and you see similar markers from Colonel Wolf, but not as pronounced."

... and like that he was lost, "I thought you were talking about Colonel Shepherd." The First Prince replied.

"Oh I am, I'm getting to that. You see Colonel Shepherd reported to the Magistracy he'd spent time in a stasis pod." The man adjusted his glasses, "Even reported some of the symptoms of memory loss associated with it in some persons"


"So he's another," He paused, "Clancy?"

"Probably." Banzai waved a hand, "But no that wasn't what I was getting at, it was the similarities in phenotype presentation."

The Buckaroo was known for the cheekiness but Hanse really would have preferred to be in on whatever 'the joke' so to speak was, "In English doctor."

English in this case was speculation over who might have kept access to Star League era medical technology besides the Canopians. A fact that the Dragoons had been bad about concealing. They'd figured out that the Star League was gone, that the great houses were at war, but they'd terribly misjudged what equipment would be common never mind how quality of life had declined in other ways.

"As I said there are similarities in the expression of certain factors." The doctor shook his head, "I think it explains his age."

"How so?"

The was a cluck, "The Hegemony, like the Alliance let people with the right connections in even before the peerages. James McKenna was sponsored into the Naval Academy, and was by his eighteenth birthday commanding an entire fleet. Given the disaster of the Amaris I'd guess that our colonel... I would guess had his parents pull him up the ranks to lead either nepotism or because he was considered politically reliable enough or something... but then something happens and he's shoved into a stasis pod... in the vernacular," He grumbled "and then sleeps for two hundred years."

Hanse Davion, Duke of New Avalon and First Prince of the Federated Suns nodded. "You said something about expression characteristics."

"There is a certain degree of talent, skill expression. There is no mechwarrior gene, per se its more about different neurological functions. Kerensky, and Wolf, and Shepherd all show varying overlap in their expressions. The Hegemony was known to play god like that, and there were always rumors about what House Cameron did to themselves, and what rich Terrans could go and pay for. Why wouldn't you give your children the absolute best advantage they could have?" The doctor shrugged, "The Hegemony probably put thousands of officers into stasis tubes, or had that many otherwise flee into the reaches." Blue eyes seemed to ripple in the changing light, "That, " he indicated the dna strands, "It and the fact he seemingly has valid SLDF codes that are gene locked tells me either he's the genuine article or his parents were. Someone went to a lot of trouble to raise a mechwarrior of superb skill, ignoring anything else."

"Yvonne thinks the Combine did something."

The doctor shrugged, and with an exaggerated exasperation snorted, "I'm just a doctor, Hanse not some int wonk." He ran a hand through his hair. "Ask him about it when he gets here, in fact send him in for a physical. I want to see if there is actually something to synch ratios and all of this genetic determinst stuff like those books you gave me talked about."

Hanse's lips set into a thin line as he thought about Halstead station. The discovery of the 63^rd Mechanized Infantry Division depot after centuries on Elidere had been a windfall, and of course he'd been promised through intermediaries that there were other boons that could be offered. Not that nobles weren't usually quick to promise more than they could hope to deliver in hopes of winning favor, but thus far more than he'd have expected had already been delivered.

His champion had confirmed that much. There was a clamoring, which had really begun with his brother's death for revenge against the combine, that he very much felt... but actually pursuing it had seemed difficult. "He should be on his way," It had been over three months since the news over the defeat of the 19^th Galedon regulars.

The duke of Elidere's ability to pay ComStar to keep the line of communication open mostly to his immediate overlord Lord Aaron, had not precluded him from the expense of a direct real time report on that matter that had had to be broadcast through the Kestrel HPG, before one more transmission it reached New Avalon.

It was behavior in general somewhat unheard of. Perhaps in the Star League's day where the SLCOMNET had apparently been both faster, more reliable, and also cheaper then the call would have been one thing. The Duke of Elidere's call was unusual in other ways, but the events on Elidere had also spread through through the realm as a result. Initial fears of a combine incursion, then swelling as the tide turned, and of course ComStar's local chief of station had been taken hostage by agents of the dragon, that had gotten out as well around the same time as confirmation was delivered of the damage done to 19^th, before confirmation of the Galedon Regulars destruction.

By the time that destruction had been confirmed Precentor New Avalon had already been demanding the data roms to promulgate throughout the realm.

Hanse Davion had never planned on being first prince. That had been Ian's responsibility. He had been brought up to support his brother's reign, and he'd worked towards that end until Ian had been killed. Then all of a sudden he was first prince, and the war with the combine, the conflict that had existed for some three hundred years particularly who counted the Combine's insertion of themselves into the Davion succession crisis of the 28^th century, was not much closer to home. It was impossible to tell the people to wait, or to consider how best to game this out for the greatest strategic benefit. There was too much going on, but it was impossible to miss that ComStar's apparent signal and facility issues were so much less of a problem when they had their own personnel threatened.

... and while not every world in the Federated Suns had been told immediately the Precentor New Avalon had made it a point to insure the dissemination of the news of the Battle on his own remit... and if Yvonne was right that news was spreading through the Combine as well... and that could ... would likely have significant repercussions.
--
Notes: Extras, so among other details this touches on a number of different things which have either been referenced to have happened or ideas I had considered relatively early on, and some of those ideas were later transferred to the drafts for Essence Wielding Social General. For example in EWSG Odin is a MechWarrior Phenotype now in that I have decided if that means he actually 'True Born' i.e. Did his parents stick the zygote into an iron womb or is he more like Jaime Wolf who has a 'true born' father but was a conventional pregnancy by his mother. That's explicitly a character detail.

Gene is probably / not definitively, but the implication in this snippet is that he's probably the product of mama was too busy to carry a baby to term so he was artificially gestated in what the clans would call iron wombs. Maybe there is some Hegemony Gene modification there, because that was what rich hegemony parents did.

This brings us to is Gene SLDF or not. Thats one of things where this story has had other idea that came together. I've left it vague. Gene has credentials that say that, and in one early iteration of the story it was the AI generated them before Gene woke up, where as in another version the idea was well its the blending of one transmigratory soul into the stasis body of someone put in the tube.


Admiral Clancy has been a thing in this for a while in the drafts, in terms of posted content he gets mentioned in the Highland Faire extras regarding castle northwind from a couple months ago. And on that, one of the following snippets to come is a Marauder and other SLDF units fighting Rim Worlders and that could be a flashback or not. [and of course in Tristan's backstory that was itself an adapation of another idea where Gene ends up in the stasis pod as a result of a mutiny, so I generate a lot of various ideas, too many ideas.] There are some other things, obviously yes ComStar stuff I don't know if that really needs to be covered.


Spoiler

Spoiler

In EWSG if it hadn't already started to show depending how much you want to read into it, but some people have suggested is Odin actually a Cameron? And that might not be an unreasonable assumption to Odin's bodyguard choice for some people to leap at

Spoiler

Spoiler
Bloodname Steiner.

Now note that that was always in the plan after rolling Phenotype and Lyran, it was too easy to pass up and has already been hinted at with Freddy's musing, but Gene was never intended to be a Cameron scion and I already had a McKenna character on the books to reuse that idea. Now that being said given how popular the Golden Blood trope is, for example see the other BattleTech Isekai Cyoa, it was certainly idea i've toyed with in other places.

Link for 'This is the Inner Sphere': https://drive.google.com/file/d/1YENKovt8urgqgK-38PiSfl3Sb8el9v1U/view?usp=sharing

In other news, Let me take a moment to reiterate how much I despise Windows 10 and its 'we're going to restart now, fuck whatever you were doing'.

 

Extras Blood on the Sand (Spring 2765)​

A warm desert sun beat down... not really hot for the planet, and the day in addition to being dry was supplemented by a decent wind moving in from the north east. It would have been by local standards been a nice day all things considered. Ideal for light maneuvering through the northern countryside

Chatter through the Network had turned from good natured banter to abrupt calls for aid from the regulars forcing them to hike down through the river bed, and by that point the fighting was already underway. The MMI threw up magnified images of the engaged units. Regular Army units in tan with painted Corp idents badges, followed by projected Medium and Light enemies painted black and tans with shark badges... that looked familiar

The Marauder's dark tan and lighter streaks were the same paint job as its lance mates.. The Archer initiated their advance bringing fire salvo-ing its paired set of twenty tube launchers. A moment later the lance's two medium mechs added another twenty tube and then the 2H's five tube Holly.

The lance divided into teams pairing a lieutenant with each forming a direct assault unit equipped with jumpjets, and a a medium and heavy missile boat pair that lacked jumpjets. The Commline linking into the Marauder's Dalban HiRez. A system capable of running battalion or regimental level command directives feeding targeting data into the medium mech on the other end's Artemis IV suite.

The five by five signal strength was good as even being walked in as the second team poured sixty LRMs into the enemy didn't change the fact that the enemy had them heavily outnumbered... and from all indications from orbit... the Navy wasn't doing much better the Taurian forces seemed to have popped off a small galaxy's worth of new stars. Whether or not the Black Lion and her escorts leading the detachment moving to reinforce the 11^th fleet would survive would depend on the tenacity and guts of the spacers.

There was nothing to be done though about the fight in space. How the Taurians had managed to get this far, and with this many troops was a question for after the fighting had been settled. The HiRez didn't pain a pleasant picture of what the situation at L1's Jump Point looked like.... the Navy had had the advantage that the enemy had had to jump in from Nadir rather than risk hitting the much smaller point, in astronomical terms, between Planet and Solar gravities. At least the Hegemony computers seemed to have maintained that advantage over the periphery rebels despite the latter someone how managing to put together a mind bogglingly massive number of mechs to throw at what was supposed to be just a relatively minor garrison.

Speaking of Garrison apparently the Capellan House Troops were defending the planetary capital to the south, their ASF hopefully doing a good job staying on the bulls just in case they decided to start popping cans of instant sunshine within the gravity well.

There was a flash in the upper atmosphere, too dim to be a blink and you miss it for the naked human eye but the computer registered the log. The Essex class SLS Malvern Hill was gone, the nukes snapping the warship's spine. Other detonations and reports of damage echoed Kearsage's fighter wings unloading their own nukes

Battalion traffic began to increase, as the Regulars were rebroadcast, "Sunray-Minor reporting massing contacts. Relaying." The Regulars XO was scrambling to consolidate his Army Battle Regiment as it was, and that meant order a shift laterally 'down'.

Talos warbook data flashed. At least those would stand out compared to the Dervish and Wasps his computer had already tagged. If the Bulls were reinforcing their already existing 3:1 numbers advantage this was going to get substantially worse as those mechs came through the productive farmland south of the river.

The LX Corp units moved to counter the advancing medium mechs, and if his Dalban was reading right the shark mechs were bee lining straight for the lance. It must not have just been him him, "Are they?"

"Assault Mechs coming, Rampage."

LRMs cycled towards the incoming, but for little good. Carrying fourteen tons of armor and loaded with heat sinks in its torso the inbound black and tan company cresting the hill apparently hadn't appreciated their harrassing their smaller relatives. "Headshots, Headshots."

The Marauder steadied legs locking as he found the lead mech in his reticle. A breath eased out and twin bursts of ball lightning echoed from his PPCs. The multifaceted cockpit assembly melted and the machine went down stumbling over its own walk, pitching into a heap that the mech behind it had to jink to the side before it tripped over.

With little better to do the Archer in their lance reoriented to rear security and firing on the Wasps they had started engaging at the beginning of their participation. The Kyudo's Extended Range Large flared white in his sensor's thermals as it fired. The Kyudo's targeting suite unlike the Archer had was equipped with Artemis IV and a second return the missiles followed the bath of the targetting laser as well as the Sorenstein's damage. The Shadowhawk didn't have that advantage. It was probably the case that the two lieutenants in the lance were equipped with Standard Hegemony pattern Archer and Shadowhawk models as a result of rank. They were support, and wingmen to the more senior pilots... and he supposed they were supposed to be showing them how it was done.

This wasn't the Combine front so the chance of one on one mech duels were slim.... but they'd been here to keep the periphery rebels in line... and if that was their mission... well they'd never expected whole regiments of TDF to show.

The niggling feeling he was missing something clicked even as his PPC's continued cycling warned him that they couldn't keep this up. Sharks... these weren't just Taurian rebels... the whole damn periphery was rebelling.

"Command positive warbook identification, Rampage, Amaris Dragoons in the field. We are engaging mixed Rim World Republic and Taurian forces." He wasn't sure the message went through and they couldn't hold this hillock from an entire assault company even after bleeding it. They simply didn't have the weight. He didn't wait for a response either, he tagged his wingman, "Lieutenant Sanders pull back I'll cover," A wave of LRMs came in and started to sandpaper the unfortunate Shadowhawk. "Go now." He ordered. "Walker," His machine obliged switching to the direct line with the Kyudo, "We're bugging out, maintain fire and cross for the rail line," The MMI highlighted an extraction root that they could circle around to join the rest of the massing Terran Mech Battalion moving to reinforce the regulars, but they needed to get clear the Vox 280 that powered the Earthwerks Archer was powerful enough to get the other heavy mech away from the assaults, but they needed to get a head start and get space if they were going to link up with other Terran units.

He safed the Magna Hellstars to let them cool, and adjusted the gauntlets firing three of his medium lasers into the armored glass of the nearest enemy mech sending it tumbling backwards, before triggering his jump jets to send him flying back away from the approaching enemy.
--
Notes: Extras this is an older segment, it was something that got written, and yeah not necessarily canon. This would be early in 2765 if it happened, basically right as the Periphery uprising occurs but it wasn t written to conform 1:1 necessarily with the actual Amaris crisis canon events as we know.
On Sunday, the usual update day, we will resume definitively canon material to the prime timeline.

 

New Avalon Travel Time Interlude
September 3017
Part I
--
Severus 'Septim' Alexander leaned back into his Merlin's cockpit, and tried the breathing exercises the boss had recommended. He didn't recall the dream he had .... actually all things considered he had slept pretty well. This was ... well not to be crass but the best paying and nicest gig he'd had ever.

The SLDF neurohelmet was a different model than the silver... not that he'd ever call it that to the Gunslinger's face, tiara but it was still almost insubstantial compared to the fishbowls most people had to use. The boss was gone, shipped off to New Avalon, and he supposed that meant the grizzled old navy man was in charge. Pasha though was content to let the Mechwarriors manage their own affairs, and so far there hadn't been any issues. Bahar was ironically busier than he was, Beau at least had the advantage of only needing to manage the missile boats of Easy Company.

It was a wild thing to contend with, and Septim was glad it wasn't his job. He wasn't really sure given how insane all of this was exactly what his job. The DropShips ranged from the combined arms carrier Sam Houston the boss had first shown back up on at Luxen carrying only a Lance... and even that was in name then ran all the way up to the newly refurnished Hidalgo that could carry an entire battalion... even if Bahar would be commanding mostly Sunny Boys if something happened.

It was such a perversely weird thing he mused. He'd be basing his own company sized force off of the Baffins and most of those would be Davion cadets that he was supposed to shepherd, no pun intended, through the crucible of a first battle. Septim was still kicking himself for not pushing to get the remaining assaults not tagged with him for deployment, but now the boss had left to New Avalon.

He stared out, seeing double and shook himself, "Ugh." The lyran shook his head and blinked as he went back to just using the good old mark 1 eyeball to view the Scrubland exercise area. As it was they were trying to fill out four more DMM Unions and as many tank carriers as they could get. That would have been easier if they had still been banking on using San Saba to transport DMM armor, but the second the boss had seen that armor in the cache... well it was clear that he had very unpleasant plans for any snakes they needed to skin.

... any dreams septim might have had about unicorns and percherons not withstanding. The boss shipping off world meant he'd been spared the Sun's version of the Catholic Church's bishop talking holy war... and it left him wondering how this was going to work.

Bahar was shouldering much of the work load because she was tangling with their official liaison and dealing with the duke, and handling the twelve most prestigious mech warriors their employers had put forward for the 'elite special training'...

... and honestly he was glad to have the cadets instead. This job was everything ... most everything good about the Luxen training contract, but with so much more employer support... on the other hand the Magistracy hadn't wanted to invade anyone, while the Federated Suns were spoiling for a chance to get even against the Combine. Totally different situations.

... and, looking at his heads up display, he could understand. People like Alessandro Steiner, the previous Archon, had talked about this sort of thing, about how they needed to stand up and take the fight to other successor states, but even his message was moderated by other factors leaving truly radical proposals to members of the nobility, the social generals especially. Advocating for this offensive or that offensive, and stirring up the middle classes for short bursts of motivated action, but never seeming to go far enough if they succeeded at all.

The difference he supposed was that they had a better spring board to work from. A better foundation in the form of the Snakes were already down a Regiment. The boss had said that accounted something like one and a half percent of the Combine's offensive BattleMech power, possibly as much as two percent depending on actual strength, but not likely to be less. That didn't sound like much... except thinking in terms of the modern value of a BattleMech... that was a hundred and fifteen mechs, and the Federated Suns were looking to compound those losses.

There was a ping and a handshake between his mech and Bards, and Septim strained against his harness as he sat up, "How was your run time?"

"We're making progress."

There had been talk about pulling all the Mechs out of the cache and constructing units out what they had found. That had gotten shot down because most people were already familiar with their specific chassis. There were people who were clamoring for Marauders after Elidere, but as the boss had predicted searches had confirmed none to be present. People though, much like how the Magistracy had looked at Luxen's Roms, watched the battle roms of Elidere and Ander's moon and watered over the prospect of the seventy five ton machines as the tip of the spear.

"That's good." He replied keying the mike. Progress was good. "I don't want to fall behind the schedule."

"Certainly not." The scottsman agreed, especially because there were now indisputable rumors that the Duke of Robinson was serious about standing back a third Robinson Rangers he certainly had the material for such a command. They didn't have the time for that. "I wouldn't want to be the one to have to pass that along."

That was the truth. This wasn't the periphery. This was the big leagues. This was a gig for one of the Successor Lords, for a Great House of the Inner Sphere. House Davion was going to make war on House Kurita in nominal response to the Draconis Combine's attack on Elidere.

If they pulled this off, they were basically set for life. This was the sort of chance most mercenaries never got... and more than that, they had the chance to not just to take the chance, but to actually potentially win the game.

-
Two hours later after the last round of drills in the Blue Zone he was cracking a beer with the guys... the veterans of what had been a scratch company of what the Magistracy could cobble together, "How far do you think the news has gone? About Elidere?" Chang asked as yet another replay filled the trivid.

"We've been told its all over both sides of the border." Federated Suns, and the Draconis Combine, "I don't see why it wouldn't have spread to the other successor states, but who knows if its hit the periphery yet." Beau replied extending his beer to click against his.

"They said its the biggest single battle loss in recent history."

Which might have been true, or the FedSuns talking head could have been fudging things for the sound bite. "I suppose its been pretty quiet over the last couple years." Septim replied. It really depended on what the fuck recent was supposed to mean. For the average person on the street the news was probably welcome, especially given the usual sentiments of the average joe in the Draconis March.

Chang put her strawberry daiquiri down, "So the boss is where?"

"By now, probably Kestrel." Then to head off the question before it could b e asked, Septim shook his head, "They're not going to visit." Leaving aside the way the boss was about space travel, they didn't have time. It was five jumps to New Avalon. It'd be another three weeks to get them to New Avalon, "Now, on the way back... I don't know."

"More likely they'll be on New Avalon waiting." Beau replied.

"You think?"

"The dukes of kestrel are immediate vassals to the first prince as lord of the Crucis March." The larger man shrugged. "Word about the cache's discovery has been," that they were "trying to keep mum." about it. And it was four months to the combine border even assuming that the snakes did find out and that assumed that they could launch immediate... and with the situation it seemed likely they'd have some kind of warning..

"That's going to be a hell of a shock. Did you see what the Maguanacs were doing with those Alacorn things the boss wanted?"

The Azami tankers had been scary enough in their sixty tonners, even before the boss had started wanting to give them LBX 10s from the travelling merchant... the assault tanks just, "Yeah I saw them." Especially in the dusk, when the streaks of dust they kicked up in the scrub land was especially noticeable. "Those tanks are like what four hundred years old?"

"Yeah the plate says they rolled off the factory on New Earth March 2616." There was a pause, and he gestured to the box of material on the floor, fresh from the book binders, "I'm not looking forward to grading these."

Chang snorted, "Don't look at me, We agreed to split the load, even Hanzo agreed to help grade."

Septim snorted at the prospect of the quiet man grading papers. Everyone had their own part, and it'd take the boss five weeks to get back from New Avalon, so really they'd be here until they shipped for Northwind. "Don't remind me, we've got so much to do, and thats not even counting getting to Northwind by Christmas."
--
Notes: So on the travel segments looking at the outline... or the several iterations of the outline, some fudging of the dates will need to be done to account for BT's slow FtL. Its roughly 3 months travel time from New Avalon to Northwind, which is somewhat complicated given Highland Faire's original 5 January 3018 date.

Anyway for this time period this is the first of Septim's segment as we explore our Lyran friend's perspective of all of this and he deals with his side of things, and we will also see the perspectives of the rest, but this is more or less a get the ball rolling. The Interlude series will probably be the usual ten segments. This is one is missing some of the commentary regarding the cache, the mention that yes Lord Sandoval would like to expand his house forces, but we haven't gotten to name droping Robinson standard battlemechs yet. Or dealing with the manuals to diagnose getting weapons to properly communicate talking to TTS computers, or stuff that has become lost due to the succession wars. Also we don't deal with some of the dynamics of feudal politics that we're going to deal with at some point... and not just for the FedSuns.

 

Travel Interlude Part 2​

September 3017​

He ejected the magazine from his stainless autopistol and reloaded before retracting his target. Hanzo was aware that there had been considerations of moving him to a more powerful mech. The recent discovery was such that there had been discussions to move several members to functionally identical mechs that were available.

One key reason to not simply move all of the company to the venerable Highlander was it would have certainly demonstrated that these were like the Marauders of the SLDF the command mechs and should be attacked first. The ninety ton mech was also too slow, at least by his preferences. They needed to move fast.

The Thugs were out because they had been constructed on Errai, which had of course been a target by the recently defeated General Samsonov and his regiment. There were talks that Hanzo had overheard simply by not speaking, and actually listening to people that the first prince might be willing to invest in Errai to get those machines to be produced by the Federated Suns. So those had been eliminated. The eighty ton machine had other limitations given its missile capabilities were strictly SRMs, but if it had been an option he'd have been happy with such an upgrade.

Hanzo inspected his target, deemed it satisfactory and left the range after cleaning up. There was going to be a lot of work to do. The boss was off world, and while he was dutifully focused on the training manuals and instructions he had his own responsibilities leading the light lance raiding and reconaisnce patrols. LRRP as it had been terms in one annex memorandum.

They were preparing for a glorious battle. Honor awaited them. Every day his skills grew sharper as he trained... and one day he would move to a heavier mech, once he was ready for that. Besides his cicada was fleet, and effective for the role he played. With a glance to the curtain of dusk falling he considered retiring to his room to read. There was no end to material to study. Hanzo had always viewed improving one self as important, but on the periphery combine arms tactics directing light mechs to scout for heavily armored tanks or self propelled artillery had been ... somewhat low on the priority.

Combing through the St George records he had viewed numerous instances of effective combined arms actions by BattleMech Brigades of the Hegemony. Especially given the tactical and operational emergency protocols directive that had been distributed to the others. Pursuant to ancient Hegemony tradition in the event of a position being lost or overrun by hostile forces and the defenders overwhelmed a directive existed to retask all available artillery and air assets to their aid.

Broken Arrow.

An amazing prospect. They had been drilling with artillery since arrival, and of course the Machine Spirit had guided precision 'fires' onto enemy forces in what Davion forces had called danger close time and time again. Of course they did not have the ancient Hegemony intelligence and its war machines with them, so accommodations had to be made.

... but it was an amazing prospect. As it happened the Azami still had a few working examples of target acquisition gear developed by the Hegemony in the late 26^th century and with the acquisition of several chaparalls they had a sufficient number of Arrow IVs if it came to that.

Of course a Broken Arrow invocation was a final recourse. He had seen a Battle Rom of Hegemony officers only invoking it knowing that they were remaining behind to protect withdrawing comrades for the counterattack after the artillery. Other Roms, including the 'Wildfire' invokation of Tristan's last remaining Terran officer had been done to protect the Hegemony against treachery even knowing that it was a situation of 'mutually assured destruction' against the rebels.

The 'TOEP', the Dervish pilot insisted on pronouncing it the same as the color 'taupe', Memo had pointedly not included a Wildfire protocol... but he supposed that was reasonable. Such Hegemony fortresses as required such necessary measures.
--
Hanzo initiated the start up on his BattleMech. The Cicada's primary computer informing it was Monday morning, and the local weather forecast collecting the data through the Battalion tactical data network provided through the Daimyo HQ and the Atlas.

The rain of the previous Sunday evening had passed them in the night, and the forecast looked promising once hte morning fog cleared. Chang was already moving the Atlas through its start up motions. Unlike Septim's Merlin the repairs and rebuild hadn't had any particular hickups. There hadn't been any problems with the engine, gyro, or surprisingly enough the PPCs. That had proven something of a relief to the techs as PPCs had a reputation for being finicky to install.

The hundred tonner painted in a similar dark earth tone with lighter sand streaks of his own mech, as well as that of Bahar's mongoose. It was an SLDF Desert Warfare camo, or a variation of, he'd seen the Eridani use a similar though not identical version the scheme in the orientation roms they were going to be covering later in the week for joint operations.

What was missing from the exercise field was a Marauder... rather a specific marauder. The davions had a few, but the abscence was palpable. The division of labor spread their ranks somewhat thin, and most certainly weakened their staff learning component. Septim certainly was trying, but the Lyran was overwhelmed by the numbers in the unit, despite an admirable effort to integrate the Robinson tankers into formations with the medium and heavy battlemechs line of advance in simulator and field exercises.... but there were limits.

Then again he suspected the Davions had known that. The Battle Roms cataloging mech engagements following Elidere had far and away established the skill of individual pilots. Of course that had been an issue for the youngest participant at Elidere, and on Ander's Moon. Mr Sutton wasn't old enough to shave yet and had mech kills to his name, which made him stand out amongst the cadets.

He maneuvered his Cicada around the recently repainted Dervish. The '-Md' had been in the green and earth tones of a temperate clime paint scheme to match the forests and hills of Elidere. Now it followed the Robinson Ranger inspired training battalion colors. Cadet Sutton's ownership of his own mech did not necessarily distinguish him as much as it might have elsewhere. What distinguished him was his participation because he had already seen battle against his realms ancestral foe.

Sutton would have the distinction of definitively being part of the unit that would be going on the offense. The bottleneck there was one of space lift capacity. The sooner they had to attack the less time they would have to gather JumpShips. A month ago that had been manifest in the concerns that if the Combine attacked first they wouldn't be able to life the sixty plus mechs they had to the battlefield in time to meet the combine... but in a few months they should have sufficient DropShips to accommodate.

The Cicada's communications hardware notified him of the incoming handshake with a chime. Beauregard Alexander had the missile boats preparing for final start up checks, the last pilots would be moving to their machines, and then they could start the day. The different Mech Companies needed to be able to work in tandem with each other as well as other arms of battle, which was what this was designed to test.

He affirmed his receipt mechanically through his neurohelmet and continued to navigate his Cicada to the starting position. His mech wasn't the only medium mech in the formation two Pheonix Hawks had replaced lighter machines, but that merely emphasized the volume of Valkyrie as the Light Company's most common mech. It made the LRRP's objective of Find Fix and Finish easier.

The F3 Principle was less glorious than individual warriors dueling one on one but it played to the speed that was the strength of light mechs. They were to find the enemy, fix them in place for engagement by larger units, and if necessary then finish the fight while the enemy were engaged before they could withdraw, counter attack or attempt to otherwise regroup.
--
Note: Not much going on here, we don't actually get Rio and Hanzo tangling, though this does forewshadow the later mech upgrades of moving some people to different mechs as in Hanzo's case the Cicada is basically a somewhat better protected bug mech. (Basically a heavier Jenner)

And on the Jenner in addition to the SLDF having the A, somehow Kerensky kipped off with the later common model... which resulted in the Jenner IIC and Clan wolf having them. As opposed to taking the 7A SLDF version and developing I don't know some long range sniper duelist mech... zellbringen machine.. (I mean out of universe sure, but with all the il clan oh the clans totally have this and this and version whatever with the rec guides).