Blood on the Horizon (Battletech SI)

[MarkWarrior]

Chapter One Hundred and Seven: Mounting Defense
Northwind, September 13th, 3025

“I need that artillery fire in the grid I asked for now or we’ll be overrun.” Colonel Romano Senn-Liao repeated into her hardline communications. “We’re barely keeping them back with our tanks and infantry.”

“Sorry Colonel, we’ve been re-tasked with a fire mission that takes priority over yours.” The artillery commander responded. “We’re finishing up and then we’ll swap to your fire mission.”

“You don’t understand.” Romano repeated into the device. “We’re at the final fallback point, and if we don’t get that fire mission we’ll have to go to ground and disperse.”

“Who gave the command to retask?” Romano asked.

“Major Henderson ma’am.” The artillery commander responded.

“Well I’m countermanding her,” Romano said. “She has ‘mechs at her disposal and can wait a little bit longer on the artillery.”

“Aye Ma’am, resuming fire mission on your coordinates.” The artillery commander said.

“Thank you, I’ll make sure that you don’t take any flack for this.” Romano said as she turned to hear the rumble of the guns in the far distance and watched as the rounds arced down into the enemy battlemech company, causing them to be destroyed in the cases of the lighter machines, and to stumble and take armor damage in the case of the heavier machines, but it helped her even out the playing field, and enabled one of Romano’s fiery surprises to be detonated by the falling artillery.

“Thanks for that Captain,” Roman said. “You just saved two battalions of Militia.” She put the receiver down and got on the encrypted short distance channel that all of the militia were plugged into courtesy of Sharpshooter Inc.
“Move it!” She commanded. “We’ve gotta get out of here and across the river before they manage to recover.”

“Yes ma’am.” The varying company officers responded as they moved to get away from the burning battlefield and into the next one.”




September 15th, 3025

“You can’t just countermand me like that!” Major Holly Henderson, the XO of the 1st Kearny Highlanders regiment yelled at a calm Romano. “My mechwarriors could have died.”

“How many mechs did your people manage to down?” Romano asked softly.

“I’m sorry, can you repeat that?” Henderson asked violently. “I couldn’t hear you over the lance that I lost.”

“I said,” Romano spoke a little louder but still calmly. “How many ‘mechs did you manage to bring down with your battalion?”

“Equivalent to the metal we lost.” Henderson replied. “Why?”

“Because my people downed an entire company of ‘mechs with that artillery fire combined with the traps that we made beforehand.” Romano cleaned from underneath her fingernails with a combat knife. “I would say that we didn’t even need your battalion except as a distraction, so you can suck it up, and act like an officer of the Northwind Highlanders, or you can give me your command and I’ll take care of it myself, I don’t have time for this sort of petty behavior, and neither do you. We’re outnumbered, and outmassed due to them capturing the majority of the other two regiments ‘mechs, so suck it up and help me defend this section of the planet until reinforcements get here, or don’t, and watch as I turn this place into a hellhole trying to make sure my people make it out alive.”

Romano stood up from her chair and spun her knife in her hands before setting it down on the console in front of her to begin pulling the armored undersuit for her Mithril on. “I’m heading back out into the fight.” She stepped into the outer layer of armor and started sealing it into place. “Join me if you’re ready for war instead of a duel.” She picked up her knife and spun it into the sheath that she kept on her chest.




Northwind, November 10th, 3025

“This is Colonel Packer of the 1st Kentares Guard.” He said on the comms after they had cleared out their LZ. “Anyone from the Northwind Highlanders or Northwind Militia still alive out here?” He looked at the still burning forest around him.

“This is Colonel Romano Senn-Liao of the Northwind Militia, I’m currently the only ranking officer still able to command currently. It’s damned good to hear your voice again Packer.” The relief was audible in her voice.

“Good to make it here in good time.” Packer said, “We moved as fast as we could, but it never feels like you make it in time.”

“As long as we’re still here then you made it in time.” Romano said. “I just hope you brought some metal with you, because we’re down to a company of ‘mechs and a lot of walking wounded.”
“Oh,” Packer said with a grin as he walked his MAD-2T back towards the LZ. “I don’t think that’ll be much of a problem.”

“I’ll give you some coordinates, we’ll meet you there, Colonel Senn-Liao out.” The comms channel closed itself.

“You heard the lady.” Packer said, “Move like you’ve got a purpose and get unloaded, we’ve got a lady to reinforce.”




November 12th, 3025

“We’ve got wounded over here!” A noncom of the Northwind Militia shouted as the 1st Kentares Guard came into view.

“We’ve got MASH trucks in the middle of our formation.” Packer responded, “Direct them to where you need them.”

“Yessir.” The Noncom said and he began to get the MASH trucks into places where the wounded could be loaded up and worked on.

“Colonel Senn-Liao, I wish I could say that it’s a pleasure to see you again.” Packer said. “But I’m afraid that may not be the case.”

“Man, you're a sight for sore eyes Colonel.” Romano said, “We’ve been holed up in this cave since most of our ‘mech forces were taken out.”

“Well, I hope you’ve got some pilots to spare, because we brought enough extra to fill out two battalions of tanks and one of ‘mechs.” Packer said. “We got reports that they managed to capture the repair facilities the 2nd Kearny and Marion’s Highlanders were using.”

“Yes, they took those in the beginning of the attack, and have been keeping their forces in the fight for far longer than we could keep up.” Romano sighed, “It doesn’t help that My husband, the CO of the 1st Kearny, had just gotten to New Avalon when this whole thing kicked off.”

“And the remaining officers don’t know how to treat this like a war.” She scoffed. “They might not consider us honorable” She mocked. “There is no honor in war and there is slim to none to be found in my family.”

“Well, we’re here to help, where do you need us?” Packer asked, “You’ve been on planet since the invasion, so I figure you’re the local expert, the CO of the 2nd Kentares Guard is on the second continent, trying to secure the Highlander factory that Sharpshooter was helping to restore.”

“That would be Godbolt right?” Romano asked, trying to rack her brain for the correct name. “She’s a good CO, she’ll do fine over there, the main issue is the Daidachi Warrior house on this continent plus the 1st St. Ives Lancers that Candace brought with her.”

“She really wants you dead doesn’t she?” Packer shook his head. “I don’t think I’ll ever understand it.”

“She has to pursue me with all of the forces she can reasonably use, or MASK will kill her.” Romano said bluntly. “I’d have done exactly what she did, and that’s what scares me; if I think like her now that I’m mentally stable again, just how bad off is our father and how far would my own madness have taken me?” She had a full body shudder in her Mithril, despite the interior air circulation keeping it at desired temperatures.

“Well, let’s go make sure that something really bad doesn’t happen, because Max might have MASK waiting with Chemical or Nuclear weapons should Candace fail.” Packer said as he realized what potential things might happen, rushing over to his ‘mech, he sealed his helmet and signaled for everyone of his forces to do the same, using his slate to sync up his suits comms with his ‘mech’s he broadcast to all of the 1st Kentares and had it sent to Colonel Godbolt as well.

“Make sure everyone’s seals stay tight, we’re dealing with a possible NBC threat, I repeat, seal up.” He turned to Romano. “Are all of your people in Mithril?” He asked.

“No, only half of our infantry.” She shook her head. “Unless you brought extra.”

“We always bring a lot of spares.” Packer said. “We make thousands of the suits every year, we should have enough to give them out to your current forces.”

“Then we need to make that the top priority.” Romano said, “Candace likely wouldn’t order an NBC attack, but a fanatical MASK cell that thought she wasn’t fulfilling her orders might.”




November 15th, 3025

“Hit that Atlas!” Colonel Rachel Godbolt commanded her Alacorn’s crew while she reviewed the battlefield. “We’re not seeing enough enemy machines for that to be an entire Warrior House we’re up against.”

“Ma’am, Atlas is down.” The gunner reported. “We’ve got ten salvos left.”

“Good to hear, we’re closing in on the Highlander factory complex.” The driver said. “Why’d we relocate the damaged factory for restoration here again?” He complained.

“Because of the Northwind Highlanders you numbskull.” Godbolt responded. “And we figured it would help them settle into the Federated Suns a little easier. “

“Fuck,” Godbolt said suddenly as she consulted her slate. “Shut everything down right now.”

Looking through the periscope, the driver shut all of the windows in order to preserve their eyesight. The Alacorn shook as a shockwave rolled over them, nearly blowing them over before breaking against the side of the ninety-five ton tank.”

“Don’t power anything back on yet.” Godbolt ordered. “We need to wait a solid hour before we’ll be sure that our stuff wasn’t damaged.”

“Can I check the periscope at least?” The spotter asked.

“Yeah, we need to have some info on what’s going on out there.” Rachel responded. “But don’t throw up, our Alacorn is sealed, but we don’t know if we have a breach that radiation might have entered the tank or not.”

“Ma’am, you might want to see this.” He gestured for her to move to the periscope and she peered through.

“Dammit.” She said, “Unless any of our infantry were in a building or further away, I don’t think they made it.” She sighed, “The Shockwave would have pasted most of them against the insides of their own Mithril, if they were in cover or a building, they should be fine as long as they were sealed up.”

“And the ‘mech forces?” The driver asked. “What about them?”

“Depends on the tonnage and if they managed to duck behind a wall or building or not.” Godbolt responded. “Our pilots might be alive, but we won’t be able to find out until we can get recovery teams in here.”


“There were over three million people in this city.” The gunner finally said. “What about them?”

“Most of them are dead.” Rachel said, “And the factory is going to be a smoking irradiated crater for either a long time or a short time depending on whether it was a dirty nuke or not.”

“Fuck man, How am I supposed to fight a nuke?” the loader asked. “I can’t beat up radiation.”

“You pray that Hull sent some Oppie’s with us.” Godbolt said. “Because that’s about all we can do right now, and when it’s over, we’ll go help the poor bastards that are stuck here.”




November 15th, 3025 same time…

“Packer, the dropships are lifting off now, and we’re not in a position to intercept, oh god, they set off nukes!” Packer stopped shooting at the enemy Locust trying to run away from him as soon as he saw the mushroom clouds in the distance, and his heart sank. “We may have just won this battle, but Northwind lost a lot more.”

 

[The Whispering Monk]

And now Liao has proclaimed themselves rabid dogs. Time to put them down for good.

 

[MarkWarrior]

Chapter One Hundred and Eight: Stalling for Time
Tikonov, December 30th, 3025

“What a way to welcome the new year.” I said to Natasha and Yvonne Hazen as we observed the drive plumes. “Looks like Candace didn’t decide to limp back to St. Ives after all.”

“Do we have the Vali’s ready?” I turned and asked Natasha. “This would be the time to use them.”

“We do,” But they already started dropping their forces.” She pointed out what looked like shrapnel falling from several of the dropships as they descended.

“TAG them anyway.” I said with a shrug. “We can always try and salvage their dropships later, but we need to make sure they can’t leave to reinforce Sian.”

“Yes, those look like Warrior House dropships, not the St. Ives Lancers.” Mathis said, as he dialed in his binoculars. “I’m pretty sure that Candace did end up falling back to St. Ives.”
“Well either way, we’ve got to deal with them.” I said, “Well, if two Warrior Houses want to commit suicide then we should ablige them.” I didn’t smile, there was nothing happy about the last few months. “Take them down.” I ordered, and it was relayed to the Artillery Battalion.

I watched as the Dropships lost thrust and crashed down at terminal velocity into the landing areas that they had been aiming for, thankfully not in any majorly populated areas though.

“We need to move while we have the advantage, they know Tikonov, it was their world for centuries.” I climbed the ladder into my Warhammer. “Let’s go kill these bastards and move on, I’m tired of being stuck here.”




Capella, December 8th, 3025

“I want this done quickly folks.” Peterson said as they cleared the drop zone. “We brought extra infantry battalions from Davion space to act as a garrison force so that as soon as we’re done with the main elements of the Branford’s Grenadiers they can hold it down while we move on”

“Remember that we’re up against an Elite Battlemech regiment.” Peterson’s XO spoke up after Peterson was done speaking. “That means that even though we fully expect them to act like the typical Mechwarriors we face, we also don’t need to be cocky. People have died for lesser things in combat.”

“Yessir.” The assembled senior staff said.

“Dismissed, you know your jobs, I’m not going to repeat them to you.” Peterson said as they all went to their duty stations.




December 10th, 3025

“Hammer them with artillery.” Peterson said from the mobile HQ. “We need that company pinned down while we finish off the one over here.”

“Sir, there’s a lot of LRM’s being thrown our way.” Major Hathaway reported. “If we didn’t have the AMS systems we’d be getting wrecked out here.”

“I’m diverting a couple of Mithril companies over to your area to pinpoint some artillery and Sting strikes, just hold them off for a bit longer.”

“Aye sir, holding position until support arrives.” Hathaway responded. “Just try and make it quicker if you can.”

“I’m diverting the Stings now.” Peterson said. “Watch your fire and make sure to target any remaining enemy forces you see after they’re done clearing the way.”

The mobile HQ rocked as yet another SRM strike got close.

“Militia again?” Peterson asked his HQ staff. “Divert a couple of fireteams to make sure that it doesn’t happen a third time.”





Northwind, November 20th, 3025

“We’ve got a live one here!” Godbolt yelled out as she used the enhanced strength provided by the Mithril to lift a concrete wall off of a trapped Kentares soldier.

“Coming Ma’am.” A fireteam joined in and helped her lift the block off of the wounded soldier.

“Did I do good Colonel?” The infantryman asked. “I tried to get to cover, but it was so fast.”

“You did good, Corporal.” Godbolt winced behind her helmet as she looked at his pulped arm. “We’re moving the Argo into the system, we’ll get you back up and fighting in no time.”

“How many have we found alive so far?” Godbolt asked.

“We found all of the tankers and ‘mech pilots.” Someone reported. “A few broken bones, some internal bleeding, but give them a few months and we’ll have our ‘mech and vehicle sections filled back out.”

“How many infantry have we recovered?” Colonel Godbolt finally asked. “We had three hundred power armored infantry, and I only recall seeing fifty of them intact before we started our sweeps.”

“Ma’am, we found pretty much all of the bodies, but we’re down to seventy five of the original three hundred.” He reported quietly. “And a third of those are WIA and will need months to years of surgery and therapy before they’ll be anywhere near fighting shape again.”

Rachel muted her external speakers and cursed in English, French, Spanish, and Russian for a solid two minutes before she felt comfortable speaking through her speakers again.

“Those were all Elite Infantry.” Rachel said after she was relatively calm again. “And we just lost over three quarters of them to a single nuke.”

“Yes Ma’am.” He responded. “But we’ve recovered over a hundred thousand civilians so far.”

“That’s good news.” The Hispanic woman said. “But there were three million people in this city, and we only found a hundred thousand.” She sagged against the ruined building and slid down to a sitting position. “Now matter what we do right now, we’re going to get crucified by the media for failing to prevent this.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure of that.” Romano Liao said as she stepped into the building. “You did good work here Colonel Godbolt, and here in the FedSuns, and Northwind in particular will understand and appreciate that.”

“I got a third of my people killed.” Godbolt said, “I should be stripped of my command.”

“That dedication to your people.” Romano said after the last of the fireteam working on recovery operations had left. “That’s the kind of thing Hull looks for in his COs, I could tell from the moment that I met Colonel Packer that he had that same sort of drive.” Romano chuckled, “Even Colonel Peterson and his grudge doesn’t hold a candle to the love he has for his men, that’s why the men and women under your command are willing to still follow your instructions and commands.” Romano laughed a bit. “I didn’t get it until I had to defend Northwind from the Combine, but it clicked then that the reason they were willing to follow my sometimes insane plans was because I was right there beside them shoveling and getting things ready.”

“You did a good job here Godbolt, never forget that.” Romano chuckled. “I’m pretty sure Hull won’t let you forget anyway.”



January 3rd, 3026
“This is the last battalion that managed to make it out of the trap we set.” Mathis reported. “Are we going to offer them the chance to surrender?”

“No Mathis,” I shrugged after I took a swig of water. “The time for surrender has past.” I climbed back into my freshly reskinned Warhammer and got ready to take on the next enemy that would try and kill my people.”




Taurus, January 7th, 3026

“I’m taking the Concordat Commandos and the rebuilt Calderon Red Hand to go invade the Capcon.” Zarantha told her son. “You might want to raise some Garrison units to come along behind us.”

“Edward is going with you, he’s in command of the reformed 17th Concordat Chasseurs, and you might need the extra forces.” Thomas said, “I hope you’ve got a good operational plan.”

“I’m taking Grand Base, and Halloway, and striking out towards Sian.” Zarantha said, “Anything we manage to take along the way is just things that we can use for later.”




December 15th, 3025

“Ian, if you don’t let me take the Crucis Lancers to reinforce the 1st Marksman I might stage a coup.” Hanse said. “This is the chance to completely change the board for the rest of eternity, how can we not seize the opportunity?”

“Hanse, I’m going to seize the opportunity, just give me a minute to process everything.” Ian responded, looking at the current map of the inner Sphere. “Katrina’s going to try and hit the worlds around Terra. She’s having Frederick and the 4th Royal Guards RCT along with units of the Skye Rangers take everything around Terra through to Outreach.”

“And you know the Taurians have built up enough to take clear to Grand Base and beyond if they want to.” Hanse said.

“Fine, take the Crusis Lancers and the Davion Assault Guards, and don’t come crying to me if you can’t take Sian.” Ian said.

“Thank you, you won’t forget this.” Hanse said as he cheerfully left the First Prince’s office and walked casually over to Yvonne Davion’s office.

“I need the Potemkin, and a couple of Lola III’s.” Hanse smirked, “And we’ll want as many of the Vengeance AMS builds as possible.”

“You convinced Ian to let you take Sian.” Yvonne said with a grin.

“I convinced Ian to let me back up the First Marksman.” Hanse corrected, “Who I’m pretty certain will be heading straight there after they’re finished up on Capella.”

“Well then, want a cookie while we plan the demise of an interstellar nation?” Yvonne asked.

“I’ll take two actually.” Hanse said with a fox-like grin on his face. “I might need them after all.”

 

[MarkWarrior]

Chapter One Hundred and Nine: Reaction
Terra, January 31st, 3026

“Oversight Committee,” Thomas Marik, Primus of Comstar greeted the committee that was made up of people from the individual nations of Terra that were still intact along with several precentors from periphery states that had no clue the Holy Shroud had existed.

"I am here to request oversight on my decision to interdict all of the Capellan Confederation worlds until Chancellor Maximilian Liao is no longer chancellor, or the Capellan Confederation is destroyed!" Thomas's voice thundered with rage.

"We are all in agreement." Myndo Waterly responded with force in her voice. "Start the Interdiction, and do not lift it until either Chancellor Liao is gone, or the Confdederation is, they have crossed the line with nuclear weapons on a civilian populace, much less one of our HPG's."

"I already have the staff primed to begin." Thomas growled out. "I'll send out the message now."




New Avalon, January 30th, 3026

“I should have sent Hanse with more troops!” Ian growled out angrily as he reviewed the battle of Northwind. “Mad Max just set off a powder keg.”

“Indeed,” Yvonne said with sad tones to her voice. “I already have some of the Highlanders Regiments that were stationed off world beating down my doors to get authorization to relocate back to Northwind.”

“GIve it.” Ian said angrily “And tell Sharpshooter that we’re holding off on the federal unit tax to begin getting the Highlanders back into fighting shape.”

“I'm adding it to the docket now, and sending out a warning to any units that might come across MASK cells on worlds to exterminate them with extreme prejudice, we can't allow them to do that to anymore of our worlds.” Yvonne said, “The Capellans have crossed the line for the last time, and it's time to erase them from history.”

“We’re going to have to start raising more garrison units then ever before.” Ian agreed. “And we're going to need MIIO and DMI on their toes the entire time, they'll need to be keeping track of any potential nukes that might go off.”

“Are we authorizing tactical nukes or orbital bombardment from our Warships?” Yvonne asked.

“No, we can’t afford to retaliate in that way or we’ll have set a precedent for other enemies like the Dracs attempting to do so.” Ian said with a deep sigh. “Despite how much satisfaction I would get from pounding Sian into dust from orbit, we’re going to be seizing the planets with everything as intact as possible.”

“We can’t tell the Capellan people we’re here to help bring them into a free society if we’re going to destroy the things that are valuable to them.” Yvonne agreed. "But we might need to give Hanse Authorization for the orbital bombardment on Sian, it might save more peoples lives that way, both ours and the Madmans own."




Taurus, February 1st, 3026

"Dammit." Thomas said angrily. "We always have nukes ready to be used against an invasion force, but we would have never used them on a damned population center!"

I know sweetheart." Katherine Calderon said as she sat on the sofa in his office. "I'm angry too."

"Three to ten Million people dead because Max is a damned Madman!" Thomas raged. "I might be a touch paranoid, but I've never thought I should just nuke a Davion population center.

"He's insane Thomas," Katherine said after a moment. "You can't predict what a madman will do."

"We're going to need to send couriers to Zarantha and Edward, they need to be notified, and Costar won't be able to lift the interdiction unless we can proven we've seized the worlds we conquer." Thomas said,

“Do I need to notify someone?” Katherine asked.

"Have the secretary summon one of Hull's people, I'm pretty sure Sharpshooter has a Jumpship at the jump point they'll let us use." Thomas said as he began to hurriedly pace the floor. "




Tikonov, January 31st 3026

“How many did we lose?” I asked Packer via the Mobile HPG on the Messenger.

“We lost most of the infantry from Godbolt’s unit, and about a quarter of her tanks and ‘mechs.” He reported. “But most of the pilots and crews survived.”

“So a good half of the 2nd Kentares RCT is just gone?” I asked for clarification.

“Yes sir, and Godbolt is taking this really hard, and she feels responsible for what happened.” Packer said in response.

“Alright,” I responded. “I’ll handle it when we’re back on Kentares, we don’t have much longer to talk before we start wearing the components on the HPG out.”

“Aye sir, don’t do anything reckless.” Packer Advised.

“No promises Packer, no promises.” I responded.




Capella, January 30th, 3026

“These Grenadiers are a slippery bunch.” Peterson said to himself. “If we were any other unit we’d have been destroyed by the sheer amount of LRMs being thrown our way.”

“Indeed.” Major Hathaway responded. “We have finally whittled them down to a couple of companies.”

“We’ve been able to salvage most of their gear as well.” Peterson said. “Some Catapults and Thunderbolts are exactly what we needed to flesh out our ‘mech units.”

“Sir, we’re receiving a transmission from the Grenadiers.” The comms officer spoke up from her station.

“Put it through.” Peterson tapped his earpiece. “This is Colonel Peterson of the 1st Marksman. What do you want?”

“To surrender.” Colonel Richard De Salvo stated. “Comstar just announced an interdiction on any Capellan worlds until Maximillion Liao is no longer Chancellor, and given the fact he just used nukes for the first time in a couple hundred years, we’re not very inclined to die for him right now.”

“I’ll accept your surrender only if it includes the planet as a part of it.” Peterson said. “I don’t want to have to kill anymore militia units then necessary, and I want your sworn word that you’ll help the population acclimate to Davion rule.”

“You have my word.” De Salvo responded. “I can’t answer for any potential MASK units though.”

“I wouldn’t expect you to.” Peterson replied. “Just do the best you can.”

“I’ll arrange the meeting tomorrow after we’ve communicated with the local militia units.” De Salvo said. “De Salvo out.”

“Well, looks like we’re here until we can get some people to come relieve us.” Peterson grumbled. “I wanted to hit Sian.”

“You probably still can.” Hathaway pointed out. “We’ve taken minimal casualties aside from some wounded, and we’re restoring the enemy ‘mechs and tanks that we took, so we’ll be going in overstrength.”

“Fair, but we’ll have to wait for more garrison units to arrive before we can move out.” Peterson said. “But the Capellan Confederation falls soon.”




February 5th, 3026

“Pack it up people, I want us moving and ready to hit St. Ives yesterday.” I helped pick up some supplies and moved them into the dropship.

“We’re moving as fast as we can sir.” The Senior Chief responded. “We’ve got a lot of gear to load up after all.”

“That’s why everyone is here pitching in Senior Chief.” I said with a chuckle. “Even the ‘mech pilots.” I pointed out the sheer amount of bodies helping to load up the spare parts and everything else.

“You left us with extra ‘mechs to load up sir.” The Senior Chief said with a groan. “Maybe next time don’t take so much salvage.”

“No promises, Senior Chief,” I said as I helped move some small arms crates onto the dropship. “No promises.”

 

[MarkWarrior]

Chapter One Hundred and Ten: Aggression
St. Ives Jump point, April 2nd, 3026

“Listen up.” Hull greeted the command staff of the Ducal Guard. “We’re definitely up against whatever elements of the 1st St. Ives Lancers made it off of Northwind, and I’ve gotten reports from Dunham that there’s probably at least a battalion of the 2nd St. Ives Lancers on the planet as well.”

“We shall crush them.” Yvonne slammed her hand down on the table.

“Don’t get cocky Hazen.” I told our Ducal Guard CO. “Just because they’re not in the same equipment as us doesn’t mean that they’re not able to fight well or effectively, and on top of that, this is their home turf, so we’re going to have to be careful that a MASK cell doesn’t try and nuke us like they did on Northwind.”

“Aff.” Yvonne responded, chastened slightly. “What is the plan then?”

“We have Stings and enough Aerospace that I’m not concerned about us making it to the ground.” I started, “It’s what we plan to do after we get to the ground that we need to plan out.”

“Mathis,” Natasha spoke up. “Do you have any ODST trained infantry in your Battalion?”

“Natasha,” Mathis shook his head. “Did you think I would accept anyone that wasn’t certified or qualified in all of our training?” He laughed. “All of us are certified tank crew operators and ‘mech pilots as well.”

“I have an idea.” Natasha spoke up with a wicked grin. “And this one is something you will appreciate, Mark.”




Northwind, February 5th, 3026

“Colonel Godbolt, orders are to leave you here to continue assisting in rebuilding efforts until the rest of the Highlanders are back on planet.” Packer relayed the message to his fellow CO.

“Copy that Packer.” She replied as she sat down. “Where are you headed next?”

“We’re moving to Capella.” Packer said bluntly. “We know that Paterson wants to move onto Sian, but before the Interdiction, he was on Capella, and with Hanse Davion moving to Capella with the 2nd, 5th, and 8th Crucis Lancers along with some Warships, we know that they might need the extra help taking the capital of the Capellan Confederation.”

“Give ‘em hell for me Stephen.” Godbolt growled out. “That madman needs to pay for what he did.”

“We’re lifting off tomorrow so let me know if you need anything from me before we leave.” Packer reminded her. “I can spare some extra recovery vehicles if necessary.”


“I think we’re good here.” Rachel said after she browsed her slate looking for her logistical information. “We’ve got rations and the Civilians here are more than willing to sell us extra food.”

“Just remember that we might have some issues with another potential attacker before the rest of the Highlanders get here.” Packer reminded, “I’d be wary of some potential “Ronin” stepping in to try and attack while we’re gone.”

“I’ll hold down the fort.” Godbolt said. “Hull left me orders to go back to Kentares when the Highlanders get here though.”

“Then follow them.” Packer said. “And if you need to leave someone behind for a bit, Carter is a fantastic XO for any remaining units.” He sighed, “I tried to get her, but she applied for the 2nd Kentares instead of the 1st when she transferred out of the Marksman.”

“I’ll consider myself lucky then.” Godbolt said with a sad smile. “I’m just glad she made it out alive given that she’s infantry.”

“Aren’t we all Rachel, aren’t we all.” Packer agreed.




Capella, February 10th, 3026

“You mind explaining why MASK keeps trying to kill you?” Peterson asked the CO of the Branford’s Grenadiers. “Because that’s the fifth cell we’ve taken out since you surrendered.”

“I guess growing a brain means that I need to die.” The other man sagged. “I’m not committing suicide with me or my men, and if Chancellor Liao wants us dead, he could have just ordered us to go fight and die for a Davion World, but to send MASK after nearly seven hundred years of loyal service then…” De Salvo trailed off. “You fought against us, but you made sure that my pilots were treated well and that all of my men, and the local militia were given great care.”

“What are you trying to say?” Peterson asked.

“If the Chancellor is so insane as to believe that he can kill units loyal to the Confederation, then he has another thing coming.” De Salvo stood up and ranted. “Is Romano truly sane as she seems?”

“Saner.” Peterson said, “I’ve met the young woman herself.”


“I will pledge myself and what is left of my regiment to you, as long as you allow us to try and save what is left of a once great nation.” De Salvo knelt. “Once we have deposed the madman on the throne of Sian, I would like to at least offer the chancellorship to Romano or Candace, in the hopes that they preserve what they can.”

“I accept your personal oath.” Peterson responded, “But I cannot trust your men.”

“I will verify their trustworthiness myself.” De Salvo said. “Just allow us the chance to do this one thing, and we will gladly join your forces for the rest of eternity.”

“We’ll begin training while we wait for some reinforcements.” Peterson finally said after some thought. “If and I really mean If your people prove themselves trustworthy, then we’ll allow you the shot at revenge.”

“That is all that I can ask for.” De Salvo stood up. “You are a man with honor Colonel Peterson, despite what the media here tried to frame you as.”




Capella, February 15th, 3026

“You’re sure you have no access or knowledge of where any WMD stockpiles might be?” Peterson triple checked with De Salvo.

“None whatsoever.” He replied. “And that fact worries me a bit.”

“Hathaway!” Peterson grabbed the closest comms device. “Run a check on our POWs, they might get hit before the rest of us in case of an attack, and I want to make absolutely sure they make it out.”

“Sir,” Hathaway responded. “We just got hit with some sort of nerve gas, anyone that wasn’t sealed in Mithril or in one of the dropships is either dead, or wishes that they were.”

“Fuck!” Peterson swore while his microphone was muted. I’m ordering a full quarantine of your area, we can’t risk the rest of the planet.” Peterson began running damage control while multitasking. “De Salvo, we got a Battalion and a half of your battlemech pilots out of that compound before it was struck, they were already on a Triumph dropship headed over here, but we just lost all of the Militia POWs we had.”

De Salvo swore in Chinese and Spanish for several minutes. “Where do you need me?”

“Help me run damage control.” Peterson said before turning to a staff officer. “Get everyone sealed up in Mithril, and get me Jones, he’s Dunham’s XO, he should have some intel for me to use now.”

“Hathaway, are you still there?” Peterson double checked.

“Still here sir, I’m having some of our engineers going over the structure and locating whatever device was used now.”

“Well, make it fast, if that was their test, we don’t know what their main target would be.”

“Yes sir,” Hathaway responded. “We’ll do the best we can.”


“Peterson, Captain Bruce has been trying to get in touch with you.” A comms officer spoke up.

“Put him through.”

“Peterson, what’s left of the Rashpur-Owens Incorporated jumpship factories up here just had charges go off. The lines are offline, you may want to make sure that Ceres Metals is covered and protected.”

“I’ve got most of the RCT covering those factories.” Peterson replied and then it clicked. “Where the Fuck is Jones?!”

 

[MarkWarrior]

Chapter One Hundred and Eleven: St. Ives Blues
St. Ives, April 20th, 3026

“This is Duke Hull of the Federated Suns to any Capellan forces, lay down your arms and surrender, you will be treated in accordance with the Ares Accords.” He broadcast on the standard open channels. “Natasha, if they don’t respond in the next five minutes, start using arty to soften those positions up.”

“On it,” Nat responded. “Artillery is ready to fire once the timer is up.”

“This is Mathis, we’re in position and ready to paint the targets when you need them.”

“Wait until the five minutes is up, there’s been enough dead in this war.” Hull responded.

“I do not understand.” Yvonne said to Natasha Kerensky on a private channel via laser comms. “Why is he giving them the opportunity to surrender?”

“Because he has spent the last twenty-six years killing people who stood in the way of making the Inner Sphere a place of peace again, and everyone grows weary of destruction at some point.” Natasha responded in her Nightstar. “Even you shall grow weary of all of the bloodshed at some point.”

The Ducal Guard waited the full five minutes before anyone spoke again. “Mathis, paint the targets.” He sighed. “Let’s go ahead and get this over with.”

“Lasing.” Mathis responded. “Uploading now.”

“Firing on targets.” the Artillery battalion opened up with ARROW IV and conventional artillery. “Ceasing fire in five, four, three, two, one. Lead , we’re reloading, will be available for tasking in five minutes.”

“Copy that.” Hull responded before accelerating his Warhammer forward. “I gave you the chance to surrender Duchess Liao.” He said over the open channel. “All the blood of the past six months is on your hands.”

“Do you think I wanted any of this?” A feminine voice responded. “This madness that my father has?” A Thug stepped out with the rest of the regiment that we were facing. “I will not claim to be a victim here, but I shall not stop resisting as well, for I know what shall happen if I am to die, you will install a puppet state and Romano shall merely be a pawn of the Davions.”

“Fine then,” Hull responded tiredly. “If you wanted war then you and the rest of your sheer fucking mad family got it.” He lashed out with his ERPPC’s and tore the Thug’s arm off at the elbow. “Cry ‘Havoc!’, and let slip the dogs of war.” Hull continued over open comms channels with the rest of the Ducal Guard with him. “For now, we march to war, only to stop until our enemies lie broken at our feet.”

“Watch Mark!” Natasha commanded Yvonne Hazen, “I have not seen him this tired and angry in years, and he may do something stupid!”

“I cannot comply, my ‘mech cannot match his speed.” Hazen replied, “Winson, you have command, make sure that the duke makes it out alive.”

“Aff Colonel.” Winson replied as she moved to assist the duke before someone isolated him out as a priority target.”

“Arrow IV’s are reloaded and available for tasking.”

“Painting priority targets.” Mathis said, “Only Arrow’s should be firing, we don’t need any friendly fire out here.”

“Copy that Major, Arrow’s only.”




Capella, February 16th, 3026

“We managed to get them before they blew the factory complexes.” Jones reported to Peterson much to everyone’s relief. “We captured two of them alive and I need to know what I am restricted on as far as interrogation goes.”

Peterson made sure the room they were in was sealed and then used privately encrypted communications channels set up for this precise thing.

“Whatever it takes.” Peterson said after he had muted the external speakers on his Mithril. “We need all of the information we can get, and if it prevents another tragedy like what happened today, then we will do what is necessary.”

“You may want to leave then sir.” Jones said bluntly. “You can’t know what I’m about to do if you want to stay clean in the eyes of any sort of court later on.”

“I’m leaving.” Peterson said, “But I’m going to be putting it on record that I requested this, you’re not going down for this if someone even wants to try when this is all over.”

“Sir,” Jones saluted for a minute. “You may want to get De Salvo to help you cover the militia, and we’re going to need more bodies from Dunham, MIIO, or DMI, I don’t have the people here to do a full sweep and make sure that we got every single WMD that might be hidden on the planet in various areas.”

“I know, we got lucky that it was an isolated area that we had the POWs in, and that the weapon they deployed there didn’t spread very far.”

“I’m gonna get to work now.” Jones said bluntly, “You’re going to want to leave.”




Grand Base, March 14th, 3026

“Fuck!” Zarantha Calderon swore as she maneuvered out of the way of Colonel Pavel Ridzik’s return fire. “Just surrender Colonel, the Confederation is done for.” She broadcast on open channels.

“I can’t do that I’m afraid.” A cultured voice returned. “I am prevented from doing the thing that might save myself and my planet by the forces that my liege lord left me to defend my personal holdings with.”

“It’s the Death Commandos Ma’am.” Zarantha’s XO said. “They were expanded to a regiment in size by all of the remaining factories here, he can’t do anything but fight.”

“Have Edward push their flank in, and get the TMI liaison onto the command lines, we need to make sure that we don’t take a nuke to the face if we win this.” She growled out as she continued to fight with the enemy company led by Colonel Ridzik.




Terra Firma, March 1st, 3026

“Keep moving, we need to secure this world before we move on to Outreach.” Frederick Steiner commanded the rebuilt 4th Royal Guards RCT.

“Everybody get the Fuck Down!” Came over the comms channels.

“Who is talking, maintain radio discipline.” Frederick began to command before his mobile nearly toppled over from the shockwave.

“All surviving units, report.” Frederick commanded.

“Sir, two battalions of our ‘mechs are just gone.” Came back the report. “There’s nothing but a crater left where they were.”

“Dammit.” Frederick slammed his fist into the nearest wall, heedless of the broken fingers that resulted from that.

“Fall back to the dropships, we can’t afford to take anymore losses like that,” Frederick said through gritted teeth. “We’re going back to regroup, and when we come back.”

“We’re dropping the Hammer.” Came back the response.

“Damn Straight.” Frederick responded as he snapped a finger back into position. “We’re coming back with the hammer.”




New Avalon, February 17th, 3026

“Ian, MIIO and DMI seized all of the MASK cells that we were monitoring, and we found the components for several nuclear devices.” Yvonne reported. “We think there may be more cells we are not aware of, and they probably have a nuclear device primed and ready to go off somewhere on the planet.”

“Fuck.” Ian breathed out. “We’re going to have to lock down aren’t we?”

“We can’t do that Ian.” Yvonne said immediately. “If we do, they’ll immediately know that we’re aware that they exist.”

“We can’t just sit here and wait for something like this to go off.” Ian said. “It's probably a dirty nuke too, the Madman trying to get one last strike in.”

“Let our people do their jobs.” Yvonne said as calmly as she could. “If we get in their way, there could be a lot more deaths.”




Kentares IV, March 15th, 3026

“You people always think you’re so smart.” Dunham said to the last MASK agent on the planet. “I had my leash taken off months ago, and I’m going to find out exactly what you were doing on my planet, and when I’m done with you, there might not be much left.” He shrugged. “But that’s the price you pay when you decide to try and fuck with us.” He stood up from his chair as the bound man tried to lash out at him. “Or you can tell me now, and I’ll make sure you’re not tortured.”

“You will all die!” The man finally wore his gag off even though his hands and feet were still bound. “We are everywhere and are going to kill you all!” He burst into mad laughter. “You can try to find us all, but you never will.”

“I’m sorry to see you feel this way.” Dunham said coldly as he placed the gag back into the man's mouth. “Start him on the Narco interrogation first, and then let me know when you’re through, we’ve got some other methods that are reliable if we can’t get anything from that.”

 

[MarkWarrior]

Chapter One Hundred and Twelve: Truth, in Everything
St. Ives, April 25th, 3026

“You’re finished here Duchess Candace,” Hull said over open comms. “You’re down to the last of your effective forces on St. Ives.”

“Then come finish us off then.” Candace replied. “We know you want to kill us all off anyway.”

“So be it.” Hull responded before swapping over to the Ducal Guard’s encrypted channels. “Bring ‘em down Mathis, and try to keep as many of them alive as possible.”

“Copy that sir, springing the trap.” Mathis had two companies of Mithril hidden in the area over the last few weeks of fighting, and they had been patiently waiting for this moment. When Mathis gave the signal, two fireteams deployed from orbit, crashing down to create a distraction, while the rest of the battalion of infantry swarmed the company of Battlemechs that Candace had left, using their jump jets to leap onto the massive machines of war, and using shaped charges to break into them

Mathis himself had jumped onto Candace’s mech, grabbing the entry hatch, and using the enhanced strength on his Mithril, yanked the hatch open, and climbed in. Hitting the override switch, he shut down the assault ‘mech and knocked Candace unconscious with a short and “gentle” blow to the head.

“This is Mathis, one Duchess packed up and ready to relocate when we’re done here.” He reported.

“Good work, that was the last of the conventional forces left on St. Ives, now all that’s left is making sure that we don’t end up a smoking ruin.” Hull replied. “Have Liao moved to the prison dropship with the rest of the senior officers.”

“Copy that sir.” Mathis replied. “Moving POWs to secure areas.” He moved Candace into the jump seat and strapped her in while administering a mild sedative that he carried for jobs like this before using some tech that Rook had sent with him to factory reset the ‘mech and change it’s IFF. “This is Guard Dog, I have captured enemy equipment and am moving it back through, do not open fire.”

“We see you on our scanners “Guard Dog, “Bring her on home.”




March 17th, 3026

“Calderon, we managed to find the nukes scattered throughout the Earthwerks factories.” The TMI liaison reported. “And we interrogated the local MASK head as well, they have at least two to three cells left on the world somewhere, and it may take years to locate them all.”

“As long as we managed to get all of the Death Commandos then I believe that we’ll be fine.” Zarantha replied. “It is such a shame that Colonel Ridzik died, he would have been a fantastic source of information for us.”

“Indeed Ma’am.” The Liaison replied. “Edward reports that he’s holding down the factories, and that the garrison forces have just landed in his area.”

“Good, let's get our ‘mechs repaired, and the salvage distributed. We need to be moving on, after what happened to Northwind, we need to move on to Sian ASAP if we want to end this madness.”

“Ma’am, our latest reports before the Interdiction was that Peterson and the 1st Marksman were on Capella, if we want to help ensure a victory, then we need to be certain that we have the numbers to do so.”

“That’s the plan, that’s the plan.” Zarantha Calderon replied.




Capella, February 28th, 3026

“That was the last major cell, sir.” Jones reported. “Getting the people of Capella involved helped out tremendously.”

“No one wants to be vaporized by a Nuke or killed by a nerve agent.” Peterson replied, “And it helped that De Salvo was assisting, he is a face that they believed they could trust after having been stationed here for so long.”

“Well either way, less death and destruction can only be a good thing.” Jones replied. “We may not want to move onto Sian though, if this is what was waiting for us on Capella, I don’t want to imagine what is waiting for an invasion force there.”

“Jones, we’re staying put until I get orders otherwise.” Peterson said, “And I’m having Bruce do a quick survey of the yards up there, both the Rashpur-Owen’s yards, and the other destroyed ones, to see if there’s anything that can be done to repair both of them.”

“Just make sure he does the surveying from the Defender. We can’t afford to lose a Warship like that.”

“He has a few of the engineers that were working on the New Rhodes shipyards on the Defender.” Peterson reminded Jones. “So he’s going to send some of them over in small craft to survey for repairs.”


Liao, March 3rd, 3026



“We’ve been ordered to take Liao instead of moving onto Capella,” Packer reported to his senior staff as they entered the jump point. “I’m not exactly sure what to expect, but we may have to deal with a regiment or more on the planet.”

“We’re going to broadcast a surrender offer as soon as we are in communications range.” Packer stated. “And then, we’ll send a courier to go get orders from Davion High command.”

“We’ve got a Pueblo with us sir.” Packer’s XO said, ‘Why would we send a courier?”

“Because the Jumpship that has the Pueblo with it won’t have to go as far to get new orders.” Packer said, “It’ll be a shorter trip that way.”

“I understand sir.”

“Any further questions?” Packer asked. “Good, let’s go see about taking another world, and moving on to wherever we are needed next.”




March 7th, 3026

“Oh thank the gods that you’re here.” Came over open channels. “This is Colonel Samantha Vincent of Vincent’s Commandos. I am speaking for both my forces, and what’s left of the 1st Confederation Reserve Cavalry, we were going to surrender earlier, but we’ve been dealing with Maskirovka trying to kill us off ever since then, thankfully they didn’t use the WMDs on us yet, but it's only a matter of time if what I heard before the Interdiction was correct.”

“Meet us at the LZ we set up, if you power up a weapon then you’ll be wiped out.” Packer said. “But if what you say is true, then we’ll need to coordinate in order to make sure that we all make it out alive.”




Sarna, March 15th, 3026
“Well, that didn’t go as I expected.” Hanse observed to the surrounding Crucis Lancer COs and the Davion Assault Guards CO as well.

“No sir, we’re detaching some of the New Avalon Militia to help garrison Sarna now.” Marshal Winston Ashley reported. “Along with a Detachment of MIIO and DMI to help them root out the last of the MASK cells that might be there.”

“I didn’t expect them to just immediately surrender like that though.” Hanse said as he thought out loud. “We may want to leave behind a company of ‘mechs, just in case they need the firepower.”

“We’ve got several lances of Gladiators, Swordsman, and Von Rohrs in the New Avalon Militia we can leave here.” The New Avalon Militia Colonel spoke up. “We can leave a mixed company behind, and continue on our way.”

“That’s good to hear.” Hanse replied, “We’re leaving in two days, make sure everything is worked out, I’ll be reviewing the logistics myself along with going over plans with the Colonel here.”

 

[MarkWarrior]

Chapter One Hundred and Thirteen: Consequences
St. Ives, April 30th, 3026

“Payne,” I greeted the man tiredly. “I take it we’re having success weeding out the fanatics?”

“Yessir, Duchess Liao actually volunteered the information on the WMDs on St. Ives without coercion.”

“That’s good to hear, it may end up helping save her life later.” I said with a tired sigh. “Anything else to report?”

“We have the engineers combing over the factories and population centers here, and so far they haven’t found anything aside from some conventional explosives.” He reported. “Still, I’ve got our people on high alert, and we managed to get Comstar to lift the Interdiction on St. Ives so we can get information again.”

“Good to hear.” I responded. “Do we have any information on what’s going on in the rest of the Confederation?”

“Slim to none,” Payne replied. “We do have intel on what Ian’s orders were, and when they were relayed to various forces.”

“Any updates on Peterson and Packer?” I asked while going over various planetary reports on my slate.

“We’re seventy-five percent certain that Peterson is bogged down on Capella, and that Packer is either on Liao or Outreach.”

“Alright.” I responded, “We don’t have the garrison forces that the rest of our units did, so we’re going to have to hold down St. Ives.” I turned to look at Mathis. “All of the Ducal Guard are trained in counterintel right?”

“Yessir, Dunham and I did the training ourselves.” Mathis responded.

“Alright then. Payne, we’re on pacification duty for the foreseeable future until Ian gets us some relief here.” I said. “I’ll be operating under the guise of a military governor for now until we manage to get a proper one from New Avalon installed.”

“Anything specific that you need?” Mathis asked.

“Get me Duchess Liao, and a couple of servitors, we need to be able to see things from every angle if we’re going to be doing this properly.”




Liao, March 15th, 3026

“Colonel Packer,” Colonel Samantha Vincent greeted the other officer again. “Thanks for all of your assistance so far.”

“You are most welcome,” Packer replied, “It’s nice to have people with brains on both sides of the border.”

“We know we managed to clean out most of the Maskirovka’s leadership before you arrived on Liao.” Samantha shifted tracks. “But we also know we didn’t get them all, and that’s how they managed to take out a battalion and a half of the Reserve Cavalry with nerve gas before we could do anything.”

“Weren’t prepped for it?” Packer asked.

“No, we didn’t expect any NBC issues from people that are supposed to be a part of our own nation.” She shook her head. “But I guess I’m defecting to the Davions now if they can do that to units that are supposed to be protecting them.”

“We’ll be happy to have you after we get this mess cleaned up.” Packer said with a small smile. “I’ve got intel and counterintel people here and they’re going to start isolating the cells as much as possible shortly, I’m also having our engineers go over everything to see if there are any nukes waiting to go off like there were on Northwind.”

“Fucking Nukes!” Colonel Vincent spat on the ground. “There’s a good reason we stopped using them.”

“They don’t care about civilian targets and are indiscriminate in their use.” Packer agreed. “I need to make sure your staff and troops will cooperate though.”

“They’ll fucking help,” Samantha swore. “Or I’ll shoot them myself.”

“Then let’s get to work.” Packer brought out his slate and began sending messages to the various staff members of his RCT. “I’ll need your help to get this done though.”

“I’ll personally make sure that everything gets done.” Colonel Vincent responded.




Capella, March 30th, 3026

“This is Captain Bruce of the Defender, please verify your identity.” He had his communications officer sent to the fleet that was at the jump point.

“This is Hanse Davion, I’m sending over authentication codes now.” Came a response.

“Do they check out?” Captain Bruce Bruce asked his Comm officer.

“Yessir, authentication codes are a match for the ones we have on file.” He responded.

“It’s good to see you sir.” Bruce greeted. “Colonel Peterson is still on the ground, and probably needs some aid in finishing off the MASK cells that are down there.”

“Well, we have the aid to give.” Hanse responded with a chuckle. “No nukes have gone off here I take it?” Hanse asked.

“Nothing yet, they did manage to damage what was left of the Rashpur-Owens yards though.” Bruce responded. “And they tried to get rid of the factory complexes, but our Intel team did good work and made sure everything was dismantled before anything could go off.”

“Good, we’ll be on the ground as soon as we’re able, and we brought garrison forces with us as well.”




Rigil Kentarus, March 27th, 3026

“Archon,” Frederick inclined his head over the long distance real time HPG that they were paying a premium price for. “I regret to inform you that due to the losses the 4th Royal Guards incurred, I have fallen back to Commonwealth space.”

“It is alright Frederick,” Katrina lifted her icy expression for a moment before the mask settled back down. “No one expected the Madman to truly try anything of this sort.”

“I want to collect reinforcements and return ASAP.” He informed his cousin with a growl. “I want them dead for what they did!”

“Not up to us.” Katrina sighed, “By the time you had filled out your ranks and begun to move on Sian, the war would more than likely be over already.”

“Katrina, they killed two thirds of our ‘mech pilots.” Frederick stated. “We can’t stand by anymore.”

“I’m not standing by Frederick.” She replied. “I’m shifting you to Northwind to assist in the rebuilding efforts there, they need the help and you need to be off of the frontlines for a little while to clear your head.”

“I do not like this.” Frederick protested. “We should push further and keep the attack up.”

“We can’t do that if we’re going to continue to take losses like this.” Katrina said. “We lost more than just parts of your unit, elements of the Skye Rangers also were taken out by NBC attacks in various areas.”

“So we have to fall back in order to rebuild after our first offensive in near a century?” Frederick asked with a scowl on his face.

“Yes, unfortunately we must.” Katrina replied. “After you’re done with the rebuilding on Northwind, come on back to Tharkad, there’s some things I should have informed you of earlier.”




Kentares IV, March 25th, 3026

“How goes the interrogation?” Dunham asked. “Anything out of him yet?”

“The advanced formulas on the Clan Core helped out a bunch.” The lead of the department stated. “He and several of the others broke a couple of days ago.”

“Good, anything I need to know in order to keep Kentares IV safe?” Dunham asked.

“We’re compiling the report now sir.” The lead answered. “Everything will be there.”

“Understood.” Dunham responded as his slate chimed with a priority alert. “I have to take this, I’ll go over the report later.”

“Yes?” Dunham asked. “What’s going on?”

“We found the MASK stash of nerve agents.” A field officer reported. “We’re going over everything now and have a HAZMAT team on the way.”

“Evacuate the area just in case, the last thing we need is for it to go off.” Dunham replied.




New Avalon, March 30th, 3026

“Yvonne, do we have an update on that nuke yet?” Ian rushed into her office.

“No Ian, I would have let you know if we had an update.” She responded. “We don’t have anything yet, dismantling deep cover cells takes time Ian, and finding these people without them immediately setting off the nuke is something that will take time as well.”

“I don’t like this.” Ian said as he paced along the floor. “I fear that they will target my nephew and niece.”

“I know.” Yvonne responded with a sad smile. “But we have our people working on it, and that’s all that we can ask for right now.”

“Alright.” Ian sighed. “I need something to do though.”

“Start organizing the garrison forces to move in after Hanse, Mark, and the rest of our people are done.” Yvonne suggested. “You’ll need more of them than we have right now.”

 

[MarkWarrior]

Chapter One Hundred and Fourteen: The Long Haul
Northwind, February 15th, 3026

“Easy on the crane!” Romano yelled at the idiot lifting the rubble out of the way. “You nearly crushed some of my people.”

“Sorry Colonel,” came the response. “Controls are a bit touchier than I remember.”

“Just take it slow,” Romano said as she smoothed out her voice. “It’ll take a while to get this finished.”

“Yes Ma’am.” The crane operator responded as he slowly eased the rubble off of the roadway they were clearing.

“Alright, now that the roadway is clear, I want everyone in either their HAZMAT gear or Mithril,” Romano said, “Sharpshooter shipped us a bunch of the older Mithril suits to be used for cleanup, but more than half of you are newbies who aren’t certified on them.” She sighed, “So we’ll be spending a couple of days getting you trained up, and then you’ll be paired up with the Oppies as they go through and start the cleanup.”

“What are we going to do with all of the irradiated material?” Someone spoke up. “Because we can’t just bury it here on Northwind.”

“We’ve got a couple of Mules lent to us from the cleanups operations in Ozawa.” She responded. “Those crews are already used to handling the material, and have been doing it for the past two to three years.”


“You heard the lady!” A noncom broke up the Q&A session. “Now let’s get you all to the spaceport.”

“Yes Sir!” They responded as they loaded up into the trucks and headed for the spaceport where their delivery from Sharpshooter was waiting.




Later that day…

“I forgot how shiny the suits always look at first.” Romano said to Godbolt as they sat in an upper story looking at the people getting trained on their new Mithril suits.

“Did you know that we call the new recruits on Kentares “Shinies?” Godbolt asked with a chuckle.

“No, but I can figure out why.” Romano laughed in response. “At least you didn’t do something stupid like color code the armor to signal rank. “

“Believe it or not, that was actually an idea that R&D tried before Peterson nixed it in the prototype phase.” Godbolt said. “The very first prototypes were all white too.”

“Well, at least now they’re that gunmetal gray, and you can paint them over quickly.” Romano said in response.




Liao, March 20th, 3026

“How did we not have something like this before now?!” Colonel Vincent yelled as she took cover behind Colonel Packer who was in his suit of Mithril. “Because no one else thought about making infantry viable in a fight again.” Packer moved over to a nearby concrete barrier so that Samantha Vincent could stop using him as cover.

No sooner had they gotten into cover before a fireteam of Mithril clad infantry fell through the air on their jump jets, taking out the MASK team that were trying to eliminate the two COs.

“How the hell did they breach our perimeter?” Packer asked the fireteam leader.

“Tunnels sir,” The Corporal responded. “They killed a dozen of us who were on break before we were able to respond.”

“Everyone’s suited up now though right?” Packer asked, setting his priorities. “We need to go over everything here and make sure that there aren’t any nasty surprises waiting for us.”


“Yes sir,” He responded. “The perimeter team caught a bunch of them in sneak suits at the same time they launched the attack from within.”

“I know that one.” Samantha said as she pointed at one of the dead men. “He was a support staff member of the Reserve Cavalry.”

“He must have helped them figure out what the right time to strike was.” Packer said. “Good thing we didn’t take more damage than this.”

“Corporal, have a fireteam break off and go check on Colonel Vincent’s people, MASK might have tried to wipe them out too.”

“Yes sir.” He responded, using a small slate on his left inner arm to navigate through the comms channels. “Diverting a couple of fireteams now.”

“Good, now let’s head to the command center, I bet we weren’t the only things hit.” Packer said as he turned away from the corpses and began walking to the room they had set up as a Command and Control center, not being willing to use equipment that may have been compromised by enemy forces.




Capella, April 7th, 3026

“Colonel De Salvo.” Hanse shook the Blanford’s Grenadiers CO’s hand. “I wish I could say that it’s a pleasure to meet you, but given the circumstances…”

“I don’t like that you’re here on a Capellan world.” De Salvo said honestly. “But it’s better than the alternative currently.”

“We brought extra engineering teams to check for any NBC’s that you might have missed.” Hanse said to Peterson. “I heard you had some MASK prisoners on my way in?”

“Yes, Jones worked them over with a full suite of the improved Narco-interrogation drugs and they gave up a lot of potential intel.” Peterson said with a frown. “But this is the original founding world for the Capellan Confederation, and it may take us months or years to make sure everything is stable enough before we can move onto Sian.”

“I brought garrison forces, but I agree.” Hanse replied. “While I want Mad Max brought to a court for his crimes, I don’t think that we’ll be able to move on until June or July at the earliest.”

“Is it that bad everywhere?” Peterson asked. “We haven’t been able to get the Interdiction lifted yet.”

“Northwind was nuked as I’m sure you all know, but MASK cells everywhere have been using WMDs in order to deny worlds to any potential invaders.” Hanse said with an angry expression on his face. “He doesn’t seem to care about his nation surviving after this is all said and done, only that no one is able to make use of anything when he’s dead and gone.”

“There are billions of people on many of these worlds.” De Salvo said with shock in his voice. “Is he trying to kill everyone who might have been loyal once?”

“We actually have gotten word of a number of Capellan forces cooperating with invading forces to help get rid of any MASK cells, much as you did here.” Hanse said with a small smile. “My hope is that integration will come a little bit easier after this mess, and that we can recover from this stronger together than we did as two separate nations.”

“We did get some word from the Taurian Concordat.” Hanse said with a smug look. “The Taurians pushed all of the way to Grand Base and are probably going to be able to push up through to around Sian if Zarantha and Thomas play their cards right.”




Kentares IV, April 4th, 3026

“We got the last of the NBC weapons that were stashed and ready to be used.” Dunham said to all of his team leads. “And we got the last of the intel that they had to offer.” Dunham stood up and began to pace. “You see, we monitor everything that comes to Kentares, and our security has only skyrocketed since the Comstar and original MASK bombing.” He sighed, “So, the only way that they could have gotten anything in was if there were a traitor.”
“Wait.” Dunham held up a hand to stave off the protestations of innocence. “We aren’t going to be revealing who the traitor was until we have all of the evidence that we need to prove it beyond a shadow of a doubt.”
–
–
Hours later…

“Are you sure that this is going to work?” Rook asked Dunham. “Because I think that this is a dumb plan.”

“It’ll work, it’s easier to find the evidence when they’re panicked and trying to hide it then it is to go looking for it in everyone’s trash or something.” Dunham said as he took a drink of a popular sports drink. “And, everybody lies, especially in this business so we’d be jumping at shadows all day, at least this way we keep all of the records that they’re trying to erase and can nab them afterwards.” He pointed out the man they were surveying. “He’s been doing this for a long time, see how he’s not moving in a hurry, but looks like he’s doing his normal work?”

“Yes,” Rook said. “If it weren’t for me literally having all of the drives here networked in order to copy all of the data over, I wouldn’t even believe you.”

“Ice cold that one.” Dunham said as he took another sip. “We’ll nab him before he gets on a Dropship headed out in a couple of weeks.”

“Why would he wait a couple of weeks?” Rook asked. “Wouldn’t he be trying to get away as soon as he could?”

“No, he requested vacation two weeks from now, and he documented it and everything six months ago, even bragged about his travel plans.” Dunham explained. “This way it looks like he’s just doing everything normally until he vanishes during his vacation and that’s when I’ll have a wetwork team grab him.”

 

[MarkWarrior]

Chapter One Hundred and Fifteen: Rooting out Pests
Liao, March 25th, 3026

“Alright, we’ve gone over all of the personnel files, and are pretty sure we've narrowed down the ones responsible for what happened five days ago.” Packer briefed the senior officers of his RCT. “Colonel Vincent has cross checked and is assisting us in locating any NBC stashes, but in exchange, she wants us to provide amnesty for her and several of her officers on Kentares.”

“I’m inclined to give them that amnesty.” Packer continued, “Her and her people have been more than cooperative, and even if we were once enemies, this may prove to be what allows the FedSuns, Concordat, and Commonwealth to integrate the people of the Capcon into their nations.”

“We need to get the cells rolled up first sir.” Mendoza reminded him. “One problem at a time.”

“You’re right Mendoza.” Packer agreed. “Now, we’ve got people who trained with Dunham in counterintel, and I’m going to need you to split them into our various infantry fireteams and make sure they have the handbook to go with it..”

“We have around thirty to forty of counterintel specialists.” Mendoza said, “And between three to five hundred infantry, that’s a pretty significant split.”

“Anyone have any better ideas?” Packer asked, “Because we have to make sure that this world is secure for any garrison forces before we move onto Outreach.”

“Put them in a dedicated team.” Someone spoke up. “And have them do a series of rapid training scenarios, while it might not be as good as all of us having the full training regimen that Dunham has them go through, it may help us get a head start, and if we have the training materials that they use, we can keep them on our slates for ease of access.”

“I like that plan, but it leaves us with several blank spots.” Mendoza brought up. “So, let’s mesh several ideas together. We hold a quick training program and get it together, and have our people go through it. Then, after they’ve gone through it we have our people split up between fireteams in order to properly utilize said information.”

“I like all of it,” Packer said, “But we still have to figure out how to implement this.”




St. Ives, May 3rd, 3026

“Duchess Liao,” I greeted the woman as she was brought in. “I heard you’ve been cooperating with my people.”

“No one wants to have that kind of blood on their hands.” Candace Liao said as she sat down calmly like she was still in control of the situation. “I am not responsible for my fathers actions.”

“No, you just didn’t stop them.” I said. “There’s an old quote from where I come from, “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” I sighed. “That, is what I think applies to you currently.”

“Oh, and what did you think I was supposed to do?” She asked with a cold expression on her face. “Die because I stood against my madman of a father? Or did you want me to start this war sooner so that you could steal more of our factories and machinery?”

Natasha stood up to do something violent before I put my hand on her shoulder in order to stop her. “Yes, if it would have worked to stop the deaths of millions of people.” I stated, “Even doing anything would have been better than nothing.”

“This wouldn’t have stopped my father.” Candace said. “He was planning this in secret for at least a decade if not more, and by doing what I did, I prevented it from being far worse than it is now.”

“Duchess Liao, there will be a reckoning when this is all over, and you will be held accountable for what you did and did not do, but until that day I need your assistance to help prevent more evil from being done.” I said with a slight tremor in my voice. “When will this stop?”

“It will never stop.” Candace said with a sad laugh. “Not while people like my father remain in power.”




New Avalon, April 10th, 3026

“Aha!” Dr. Banzai exclaimed as he looked over the latest scan results. “I think I know where the Nuke is hidden.” He looked around his lab before alighting on his slate, flipping through the applications until he reached his communications folder. “Yvonne, I think I found it.”
–
–
Four hours later…

“I tracked down an artificial radiation signature that wasn’t something that can be attributed to a Fusion reactor.” Dr. Banzai explained. “It was on a ship headed for Albion, and was approximately five days out.”

“If they’re in the middle of the ocean, should we try and take them out now?” Ian asked. “Because there aren’t any population centers out there, and even if they set the nuke off we should be fine right?”

“It depends.” Dr. Banzai said after a moment. “We know now through interrogation that they smuggled the device onto New Avalon in stages, and if they were able to manufacture it here, they may also have gotten their hands on some Cobalt or other materials that may make the immediate fallout much more dangerous, and could potentially even reach a major population center depending on the magnitude of the device.”

“But, this may be the best chance we have?” Ian asked.

“Yes, but I would only send teams that were volunteers, because if something goes wrong, they’re not coming back.” Dr. Banzai stated with finality.

“I’ll go start getting some people together.” Yvonne said. “And I’ll make sure that it’s volunteer only.”




Avalon Ocean, somewhere in between Brunswick and Albion…

“Alright team,” The leader of the two platoons of volunteers said over his Mithril’s communications systems. “We know that they have a nuclear device onboard, as well as at least five to ten suits of Mithril that were stolen from the local militia.”

“Is that why we have the prototypes?” One of the platoon members asked. “Because I thought these things weren’t supposed to be issued for another two to three years.”

“Handheld gauss weaponry is the only thing we think will work against other powered armor.” The CO spoke. “And we’re the ones who are going to be testing it out against people that are ready and willing to destroy everything that we stand for.”

The VTOL’s hovered hundreds of meters above the ship while the two platoons dropped out of them, using Jump jets to maneuver onto the ship below. They systematically dismantled all of the MASK personnel onboard until they reached the one shipping container that was surrounded by the enemy PA troops. Unfortunately, the prototype Gauss weapons were not quite up to the task yet, it took over a full magazine to penetrate the stolen Mithril Powered armor but fortunately the Davion forces had ammunition to spare and hadn't yet taken any casualties.

All that was left after they had taken out the enemy powered armor was to breach the actual container that held the nuclear device hidden in it.

 

[MarkWarrior]

Chapter One Hundred and Sixteen: Results
New Avalon, April 15th, 3026

“Are we good to go?” Ian asked, getting thumbs ups and ok gestures of approval.

“It is with a heavy heart that I stand before you today..” Ian said in front of the press and assembled families. “On April Tenth, three thousand and twenty-six in the year of our lord, the hastily assembled Task-Force 141 led by Captain John Price raided a ship on the Avalon Ocean that had a nuclear device built by elements of the Capellan Confederations Maskirovka.” Ian took a breath. “The effort that they went to in order to prevent the rest of us from dying to a nuclear device is beyond anything I can imagine. Unfortunately, Task Force 141 was not so lucky. From what we were able to recover as far as battleroms go, they were successful in every way but one.” Ian did his best to maintain composure. “The thirty-six brave men and women of Task Force 141 were vaporized in a tactical nuclear explosion.”

“Were there any other casualties?” One of the extremely subdued media members present asked.

“Aside from the Maskirovka personnel and Task Force 141 there were no casualties.” Ian replied.

“What is going to be done for the families of the fallen?” Another reporter asked.

“We’re not going to be able to replace their families, and we’re not even going to try.” Ian stated with a sad smile. “But we are going to do what we can. I have personally extended the families invitations to the Davion Palace, where we will handle the rewards personally and announce them later.”

“What is going to be done to retaliate against the Capellans?” Another reporter spoke up. “Are we going to be using nukes of our own?”

“No, we are not authorizing any weapons of mass destruction at this point, or at any point in my reign.” Ian said firmly. “Maximilian Liao might be willing to murder millions and billions of people in order to get what he wants, but I will never go down that path, and I pray that my successors feel the same.”




St. Ives, May 6th, 3026

“I believe that is the last of the MASK cells that you informed us about.” I said to Candace Liao. “If there are any others they may reveal themselves in the next few months or so.”

“I spent years compiling intelligence on the Maskirovka cells that were on St. Ives,” Candace said with a smug look on her face. “I do not think I missed any of them.”

“I’d be careful about making statements like that.” I said with a note of warning in my voice. “There’s a completely valid reason that I wear body armor all of the time.”

“No,” Candace scoffed. “You are just as paranoid as my father if you wear body armor constantly.”

I just exchanged glances with Mathis and Nat who were both clad in Mithril suits. “We shall see who is correct in the end, Duchess. And for the record your sister is much easier to get along with.” I stood up from the chair and left the section of the prefab that we were keeping Candace on house arrest in.

“Make sure we keep an up to date watch on her, I’m worried that either the Duchess herself or one of the cells we didn’t get to yet may try something stupid.” I told Mathis and Natasha. “And have a couple of Stings in the sky with fireteams of infantry ready to deploy as a QRF, it’ll burn fuel, but we can afford to burn the fuel if it means that we manage to prevent something disastrous from happening.”

“Got it sir.” Mathis said, “I’ve been keeping a close eye on our guard rotations already, and I hadn’t considered the QRF idea aside from having a couple of fireteams attached to the handles on the Omnimechs that Nat’s Marauders have.”

“Do both, we may need the firepower.” I said with a shrug before turning to Natasha. “You did incredible work on training the six of them.” I praised her.

“It took six months to break them of the bad habits.” Natasha said with a smile on her face. “And the fact that it gave me something to do while on the journey back to the Inner Sphere had absolutely nothing to do with the fact that they are consummate professionals now.”

“Oh no,” I agreed. “Absolutely nothing to do with why they’re absolutely terrified of you half of the time.”

“A little fear is healthy for them.” Natasha said with a smug look on her face. “It will keep them alive for far longer.”

“I guess it will.” I responded with a chuckle. “Shall we return to our personal prefab?” I asked.

“We shall.”



Liao, April 8th, 3026

“We managed to isolate three separate cells that have been working together.” Mendoza briefed the assorted staff including his CO Colonel Packer. “Now, we can wait and see if they have connections to other cells, but it’s probably safer to take them now, and pull these cells out before they do anything to cause more damage to the infrastructure that is on the planet.”
“Then we take them out now, and make sure that none of them escape.” Packer said coldly. “There will not be another nuke detonated on my watch.” Packer stood up from the table. “Mendoza, walk with me, everyone else, I want your plans on taking down the cells on my slate by tomorrow at 0800.”

“What do you need Sir?” Mendoza said as he walked beside his CO.

“I want you heading up our counterintelligence teams.” Packer told his XO and longtime friend. “You’re the one who got the extra training, and if we had originally been intended to hit a Capellan world, Dunham and Hull would have made sure that we had the extra intelligence people, but until we have them, we’re on our own.”

“Yessir, just let me know if you need me to do anything else.” Mendoza replied.

“Go get some rest, we’ve got a lot of work to do Major.”




Capella, April 10th, 3026

“Have you had the chance to survey the yards yet?” Hanse Davion asked Captain Bruce. “I know you were a part of the team that helped get the New Rhodes shipyards up and running again.”

“I haven’t personally done it yet, but I have some of the engineers from that project on the Defender currently, and they did take a look at it.” Bruce replied.

“What was the verdict?” Hanse asked. “Those yards may be one of the most important things to rebuild in this region before we even take a look at the ‘mech and vehicle factories.”

“It’ll take two years to fix the damage that was caused by MASK.” Bruce said in between coffee and eating a breakfast sandwich. “Five to Seven to completely repair the yards and have more than one line running for both repairs and production.”

“But they’re not totally destroyed?” Hanse asked.

“No sir, those yards and the Iona Light shipyards can be repaired, it’s just that it’ll take time and money.” Bruce offered. “The Iona Yards will take about a decade to restore to full functionality, but it can be done.”

“I’ll bring up the idea to Ian later.” Hanse responded with a shrug. “We’ll need projects like that to help bind the Capellan people to us anyway.”

“You’d be the expert on that sir,” Bruce said with a shrug. “I’m just an engineer and Warship captain.”

“And damned good at both of those jobs from what I hear.” Hanse said with a smile. “I’ll let you get back to it Captain.”

“It was a pleasure meeting you.” Bruce responded. “May our next meeting be under better circumstances.”

“Indeed.” Hanse replied, “Indeed.”

 

[MarkWarrior]

Chapter One Hundred and Seventeen: Mad Max
In Orbit around Sian, June 26th, 3026

“Hanse, there’s no radio signals, there’s no movement, there’s nothing down there.” The captain of the Warship that Hanse was on stated. “I don’t think we should send anyone down there unless we can be certain that it’s safe.”

“Peterson.” Hanse turned to the Marksman CO. “How secure are Mithril from NBC weapons?”

“Completely secure unless a seal gets breached.” Peterson responded. “But I don’t think we should go down there at all.”

“Why not?” One of the Marshals of the Crucis Lancers spoke up.

“Because I don't think Mad Max would leave just a bioweapon behind.” Peterson stated. “Most of the strategic arsenal is on this world below our feet. And if there’s no movement down there, then we should just leave it be, because if I were trying to make sure that everyone loses, I would have things set up to where the minute someone steps a foot onto the surface that it turns the planet into lava.”

“And given we don’t actually know what they had on the planet, he could potentially crack the planet in half.” Another officer brought up, “I think our best bet is to leave a Warship on duty and have daily reports sent out until something moves down there.”

“How badly do you suspect everything is down there?” Hanse asked the collective group.

“I think that we need to be extremely cautious here.” Peterson warned. “I want Max to pay for what he’s done as much as anyone here, but if we aren’t very careful here we may end up dead anyway.”

“We could use the vehicle factories that are down there at the very least.” Hanse muttered to himself. “Let’s have a volunteer team touch down around the factory complexes.” He said after thinking for a minute. “There’s no guarantee that it’s booby trapped, but just in case we need to have it be an all volunteer force.”

“Or, alternatively.” Peterson said. “We do have a couple of Voidseeker drone fighters onboard the Defender, and we’ve got one prototype that’s been modified to follow specific instructions.”

“So we send it down and see what happens.” Hanse said, “And we don’t risk losing any of our people in the process. How long will it take to get it set up?”

“Let me check with Captain Bruce and I’ll get back to you.” Peterson cut his channel off in order to go track down the Captain of the Defender.




“Captain Bruce,” Peterson ran up to the CO of the Defender. “How long would it take to get the Voidsweeper prototype ready for use?”

“Two days to put it back together and another three to finish the software patches we were working on, why?” Bruce asked as he raised an eyebrow.

“I may have told Hanse that the prototype was something that we could send down to check out Sian and make sure that it won’t blow up on us.” Peterson said a bit sheepishly.

“We can rush it and have it done in three days total.” Bruce sighed. “But you owe me one Thomas.”

“I do, I’ll go let them know that there needs to be some testing done first.” Peterson rushed back to the communications area.

“Everyone able to hear me?” He asked once he was back on the communications channel.

“Yes, Colonel, we hear you just fine.” Hanse replied.

“The prototype was disassembled while we were on Capella for some testing and software updates.” Peterson briefed them. “Bruce told me that it should be put back together and updated in three days or so if we are willing to wait that long.”


“We can afford the extra time.” Hanse said with finality. “Give them five days, we don’t want any screw ups that could get people killed.”




July 1st, 3026

“Everything all set here?” Peterson asked Bruce as he supervised a team of engineers.

“We’re just fuelling her up now.” Bruce said. “She’ll be ready for launch in fifteen minutes or so.”

“That’s good to hear, Captain Bruce.” Hanse said as he walked into the small craft bay of the dropship that the Voidseeker was currently on. “Why did you have to move it off of the Defender?”

“Because despite how effective the Dante is as an escort Warship, it lacks the Small craft bays that you find everywhere else.” Bruce responded. “So we’ll be conducting this little experiment from Peterson’s Colossus.”

“Alright then, let’s see what this thing has in store.” Hanse replied while rubbing his hands together. “Can I fly it?”

“Let me show you the controls really quick.” Bruce offered. “But either myself or one of the other trained personnel will have to take over once you’re closer to the ground.”




July 4th, 3026

“Can we go down to the freakin planet already?” Hathaway complained to Peterson. “If it were going to blow up in our faces it would have already done it, yes?”

“Hathaway.” Peterson scowled. “You just ensured that this will go the worst way possible, and I’m going to consider demoting you when we return to Kentares.”

“What do you mean ensured?” Hathaway asked right as sirens began to go off.

“Everyone to their designated battlestations.” Bruce’s voice came over the intercom. “A series of Nukes were just launched at both us and the planet from all three of the moons that orbit Sian.”

“What are we doing Bruce?” Peterson asked.

“Us, and the entirety of the Davion Fleet is leaving as fast as we can.” Bruce responded. “There won’t be anything left on the surface for us, and if we don’t outrun these Nukes, there won’t be much left of us either.”

“I thought the Defender was outfitted with an AMS along with all of the Vengeance escorts that Hanse brought.” Peterson said.

“Not enough to handle what’s headed our way.” Peterson replied. “Not enough.”




St. Ives, May 9th, 3026

“Where the hell did they pull these from?” I asked Natasha as we coordinated fire against two lances of ‘mechs.”

“No clue.” Natasha said as she laughed maniacally while headshotting an enemy ‘mech with her gauss rifles. “Did you upgrade Hazen’s mech though?” She asked.

“Yes,” I said after moving out of the way of some LRMs that my AMS had missed. “I upgraded the outdated AC/20 she was still using for some reason to a gauss rifle. Is that a big deal?”

“Yes Mark.” She said as she crippled another mech. “I thought you would have learned by now, Bitches love cannons, and you just gave her one of the biggest ones that there is.”

“Whelp,” I said as I killed an Urbies AC/10. “Maybe I should make my noble sacrifice now?”

“Do it and I drag you back from the dead and proceed to ship you off to Solaris.” Natasha said. “And you won’t be allowed back until you can prove that your win against an Atlas in an Urbanmech wasn’t a fluke.”


“Was that the last of them?” I asked after nothing was coming my way.

“I believe it was.” Natasha said. “But I sincerely believe that we may have to relocate after this.”

“Agreed,” I responded before getting Mathis on the channel in order to coordinate a move and double check some things.

“Mathis, Duchess Liao still intact?” I asked.

“She is sir, just a bit shaken up.” Mathis replied. “Should I put her on?”

“No Mathis, but have them start packing up the prefabs, we’re going to need to relocate before we get pinned down and destroyed by some arty that they were able to hide as well.

“Copy that sir.” Mathis replied. “I’m evacing the Duchess to our dropships, and securing her there.”

“Good to hear.” I replied. “We’re moving to the dropships on our own now, but have some of our salvage teams go through with some fireteams, we need some prisoners to give us some intel."

 

[MarkWarrior]

Chapter One Hundred and Eighteen: This Chaotic Mess We Call Life
July 14th, 3026

“How many people did we lose?” Hanse asked after they had jumped out of Sian.

“Sir, we managed to get almost everyone out, but the Defender stayed in the rear in order to make sure that we made it out.” The captain of the Black Lion class Battlecruiser reported. “Both Colonel Peterson and Captain Bruce were onboard along with two Sting Gunships.”

“They didn’t jump with us did they?” Hanse asked.

“No sir.” The communications officer said. “We’ve got most of the Marksman RCT, but anyone who was on those three ships didn’t make it out.”

“Do we have a ship with a LF battery.” Hanse asked. “We need to go see if we can rescue any survivors.”

“Hanse,” Marshal Jackson Davion said. “There were over thirty nuclear missiles heading directly for them, there aren’t going to be any survivors.”

“We should at least see what we can recover.” Hanse said firmly. “We’re not going to leave them as unsung and unknown heroes.”

“We can send one of the Destroyers over to double check.” The captain responded. “But they wouldn’t be able to assist with any major recovery efforts.”

“Well, we can wait out the week it takes to charge in order to make sure that we at least see if anyone is alive.” Hanse said with finality. “We’re not leaving them out there to die if there’s anyone left alive.”

“We have one Aegis class Cruiser with an LF battery that could do the recovery.” One of the crew members brought up. “They should have the extra space for it as well.”

“Send them over, I want them to make sure that we get anyone who is alive back home if possible.”




Sian, July 14th, 3026

“Anyone get the number of the bus that hit us?” Bruce asked as he held his head.

“Yes sir,” Bruce’s XO said. “The Defender is gone, Peterson threw you and a few of us into the escape pods before it was hit.”

“Did he make it out?” Bruce asked.

“No sir,” the XO shook his head. “The bridge was directly impacted by a nuke, us and three other lifeboats are the only ones that made it out.”

“There’s six of us here.” Bruce said. “And each of those escape pods or Lifeboats hold at least six of us.”

“Eighteen of us made it out of the Defender.” Bruce said shakily. “Did the two Stings make it out?”

“No sir, they were struck by two nukes that were on course to intercept Hanse Davion’s battlecruiser.” The XO replied. “We may as well get comfortable though, because we’re not going anywhere for a little while.”




St. Ives, May 20th, 3026

“We found out where the two lances of ‘mechs came from.” Mathis said. “There’s a hidden base that one of the enemy pilots had access to, and we’re fairly sure that they’re a part of the Duchess’ own forces instead of Mad Max’s people.”

“Hmm,” I looked up. “What makes you think that?” I asked.

“Aside from the fact that one of them was sleeping with Candace before her departure to hit Northwind?” Mathis asked.

“Nope, I don’t need to know.” I raised my hands in surrender. “I have no desire to know what he told you underneath the Narco interrogation about his sex life with Candace Liao.”

“You sure?” Mathis asked with a smirk. “Because I figured you’d be wanting to increase the size of your harem.”

“Mathis,” I said, “for the last time, there is no harem.”




Grand Base, March 31st, 3026

“I really hate this sometimes.” Zarantha Calderon confided in her grandson. “I wanted to push on through but instead we’re going to be stuck with integration duties for the foreseeable future.”

“And what exactly would you be doing if you weren’t here?” Edward Calderon asked.

“I’d be enjoying my Villa on Kentares IV.” Zarantha said dreamily. “The beaches there beat anything else I’ve ever seen.” She smiled, “And the security is top notch as well.”

“You know that your reputation took a lot of flak after you stepped down for dad to take over?” Edward brought up.

“Yes.” Zarantha responded. “But when you get to be my age, you stop caring about your reputation as much.” She snorted. “I imagine Thomas will step down to parent the rest of your siblings soon and leave the role to you.”

“Why would he do that?” Edward asked. “He still has plenty of good years left.”

“He does,” Zarantha agreed. “But that chair ages you, and he knows that he’s not a great fit for it.” She met her grandson’s eyes. “But you have the makings of greatness, you don’t have the prejudice that Thomas and I have against the Davions, and you’re still full of that youthful enthusiasm that drives people to do things beyond themselves.”

“But you’re not prejudiced, are you?” Edward asked in shock.

“If you had asked me that nearly two decades ago I would have told you that I was indeed.” Zarantha responded. “While Ian and Hanse probably don’t remember it very well, I remember meeting them and their father once.” She sighed. “Andrew Davion was a man who would have done anything necessary to prevent the collapse of his nation, and that terrified me as a young Protector. It led me to funding the Far-Lookers movement and beginning to withdraw us from the issues of the Inner Sphere.”

“Haven’t we always been isolationist and more geared towards defense though?” Edward asked.

“Indeed we have, and there is nothing wrong with that if you are in a position of strength.” Zarantha responded. “But we were not in a position of Strength, and it is now only through the bonds that we forged with the Lyran Commonwealth and Federated Suns that we have been able to begin recovering some of our previous strength.”

“That and Hull’s influence and help.” Edward pointed out.

“We’re not talking about personal connections yet.” Zarantha said with a smug grin. “Or should I bring up a certain Centrella girl that I saw you eyeing around six months back?”

“I’ll leave my love life out of it if you do the same.” Edward negotiated with a grin.

“There’s nothing to talk about in my love life.” Zarantha said in a faux surprised tone of voice. “Why, I’ve outlived my husband by nearly thirty years.”

“Yeah, I don't really want to talk about this anymore.” Edward blushed bright red. “I have a feeling that I might just lose.”

“You have no idea Grandson, no idea.” Zarantha laughed.




Liao, April 15th, 3026

“Breaching!” Mendoza called over the secure comms channel.

“First!” The point man said as he burst through the door of the MASK safe house. Going left, he cleared the corner before checking the other areas that someone might try to hide in.

“Banging the next room.” The pointman said as they stacked up against the wall leading down the stairs.

“Copy, polarizing.” Came the response as the fireteams polarized their visors before kicking down the doors and swarming the MASK team.

“Fucking psycho.” The pointman said. “This guy just released something inside of the safe house.”

“Seal the doors, and administer the antidotes.” Mendoza ordered after a second. “We need to make sure that they survive for intelligence purposes later on.”

“Copy that sir, administering the antidotes.” Their Corpsman said as she got her medical kit together and began with a general antidote for Nerve agents before moving on to the chemical weapons treatments.

“We’ll wait a good thirty minutes before moving out.” Mendoza said. “The last thing we want is for civilians to get killed in any of this.”

 

[MarkWarrior]

Historical Interlude: The Demise of the Capellan Confederation

The Capellan Confederation is an interesting nation to view through the lens of history. While it was once built on the backs of nations that espoused virtue and learning, by the end it had become an authoritarian state that was ruled by a madman intent on the absolute destruction of everything that he once was responsible for.

There is a wide debate on when Maximilian Liao truly crossed over the threshold into madness. Some scholars argue that he was well on his descent into insanity when he assassinated his father Tormax Liao, and yet other groups think that it was either when Tikonov was taken by Davion forces or when Romano Liao was banished. Whatever the case may be, when Maximilian came to power it was the beginning of the end for the Capellan Confederation.

Maximilian imposed many successful military policies that granted more tactical flexibility at the hands of his regimental commanders and expanded the amount of forces that the Confederation had at its disposal. The Liao’s were even able to strike back at both the Davions and Mariks at this point in time.

Unfortunately, with the destruction of a third of the McCarron’s Armored Cavalry in 3007 the Confederation had lost much of its quick reaction and raiding forces, and when the Davions finally took Tikonov in 3011 while the Taurian Concordat were taking worlds all the way up to Victoria the Confederation began a deadly spiral downwards.

With a large portion of their military production now cut off from them (1), Maximilian was exceedingly grateful to accept the five regiments of Wolf’s Dragoons as mercenaries for hire, and used them as a barrier against the Free Worlds League.

While he was using the Wolf’s Dragoons as a barrier, Maximilian Liao was unknowingly working with elements of Comstar’s ROM division in order to stir up what is now known as the Marik Civil War. This gave the Confederation some breathing room and allowed Maximilian to focus on what he perceived as the real threat, the Federated Suns.

Romano’s intervention in order to retain the Wolf’s Dragoons as a house unit did not end well for the Confederation. With many of the less radical elements of MASK being lost in the attempt to hold the dependents of the feared mercenaries hostage and culminating in her complete and total banishment from the Capellan Confederation.(2)

Romano Liao had gone from one of the highest authorities in the Capellan Confederation, to little more than a refugee. And while many regarded this as harsh at the time, it was what allowed Romano to escape the fall of the Confederation.

The Confederation was at a time of relative peace with both the Davions and Mariks for a period of around 10 years or so, which should have allowed them to begin rebuilding the losses that they had taken over the rest of the 3rd Succession War, but instead, Maximilian Liao focused on purging the Maskirovka of anyone who wasn’t fanatically loyal to him and him alone. It was also at this time that Maximilian began to send assassins and assorted wet work teams to try and eliminate his daughter Romano.

Romano at this time, had been on Northwind for several years, and had gotten a diagnosis of bipolar disorder with a slight bent towards paranoia and potential delusions. Fortunately, she was receptive to treatments, and even though she was on medications for the remainder of her life Romano began to thrive.

Perhaps it is this which caused Maximilian to launch a strike against Northwind led by his heir and older daughter Candace Liao, but we will likely never know. Max had planted Maskirovka agents among the forces that Candace had taken with her and given them orders to use nuclear ordnance to deny the Davions any military production that was taking place on Northwind.

This is where the Confederation truly lost the Succession Wars, and became the second nation to dissolve in its entirety.(3) No one had used Nuclear, Biological, or Chemical Weapons since the latter period of the 2nd Succession War, and no one desired for more learning and production facilities to be lost. So upon this use of Nuclear weapons once again, it was astonishing that the remainder of the Successor States refrained from retaliating with weapons of mass destruction of their own.

The Davions, Taurian Concordat, and Lyran Commonwealth all invaded the Capellan Confederation shortly after the invasion of Northwind, and began a slow trek towards Sian. With elements of the 1st Marksman regimental combat team being among the first to make landfall on a Capellan world, followed shortly after by Duke Hull of Kentares and his own personal guard.

From there, it was merely a matter of time until the fall of the Capellan Confederation. With different units racing towards Sian, and the Davion forces that were able to respond doing so with a barely restrained vengeance.

It was also at this point that many of the Capellan units began to cooperate with the invading forces no matter what nation. Maskirovka had been indiscriminate in their NBC strikes and had gone too far. With some units even being absorbed into the Davion forces in order to maintain holds on various worlds and root out Maskirovka cells.

Of particular note was regiment Vincent’s Commandos, who immediately surrendered and began to assist the 1st Kentares Guard in their own garrison and policing actions (4), and by the end of the campaign had been mostly absorbed by the 1st Kentares Guard. There were also other notable units such as Blanford’s Grenadiers that fought against the 1st Marksman at first, but eventually went on to assist them in eliminating Maskirovka cells and met with Hanse Davion in order to negotiate their survival as a unit.

By the time Hanse Davion was ready to move onto Sian, the Davions controlled Capella, Liao, Outreach, both Epsilon Indi, and Eridani, St. Ives, and many lesser worlds in between. The Taurian Concordat had control of Grand Base, Halloway, Houskarle, and many other worlds down to the Periphery border, and the Lyran Commonwealth had taken Sirius, Keid, Bryant, New Home, Carver V, and Terra Firma.

Sian though, was not a world that anyone was able to take. While no one really knows for sure what went on down on the capital of the Capellan Confederation, it is generally agreed that he either deliberately unleashed a bioweapon on his own population, or it escaped from the lab, either way though the result was the same and there was no detectable human life left on the planet of Sian by the time Hanse Davion’s fleet arrived. Most scholars agree that Maximilian had left a sort of dead man’s switch behind though, because after days of surveying the planet, the entirety of Sian’s nuclear arsenal began to launch itself at the Warships in the fleet. Maximilian had left silos and nuclear missile launchers on every moon and asteroid that might be in the path of a fleet trying to escape the onslaught.

This is where the Confederation met its final end, and ceased to exist as a nation state, never to arise again. The remainder of the Capellan Confederation worlds either formed individual smaller states akin to Periphery nations, or joined the surrounding nations. The Andurien state grew by a large percentage at this point, as did the Taurian Concordat. All of the nations that participated in the destruction of the Capellan Confederation spent years eliminating the last of the Maskirovka cells, and no one is absolutely sure that they managed to eradicate them all or not.

1. Tikonov, Victoria, and Menke had been denied to the Confederation after the Federated Suns and Taurian Concordat had taken those worlds.
2. Transcripts and videos of the banishment are used in many historical and political dramas today as a base for which to do similar scenes.
3. The first nation to begin dissolving was the Free Worlds League, which had been fighting a civil war for over a decade at this point, and many of the worlds had either seceded to join other nations such as the Lyran Commonwealth, or had broken up into their own miniature nation states; with the Marik state retaining more military might and industrial power than most of the other states.
4. The Vincent’s Commandos regiment had been joined by portions of the remaining 1st Capellan Reserve Cavalry, and while the Reserve Cavalry remained separate, by 3027, the Vincent’s Commandos were a part of the Kentares Guard as an independent unit.

 

[MarkWarrior]

Chapter One Hundred and Nineteen: Reckoning
St. Ives, November 25th, 3026

“Ian,” I greeted the First Prince of the Federated Suns. “Please tell me that you’re here to install a permanent military governor.”

“I am.” He responded. “I even brought her with me, and I believe you’ll find it fitting.”

“It’s Romano isn't it?” I asked bluntly, not wanting to play the games that Ian found funny.

“How do you always know these things?” Ian asked exasperatedly.

“Because it’s obvious.” I said with an eye roll. “Romano knows our laws, and because she herself integrated into the Federated Suns, she’s more equipped than many of our people at the integration part of conquering a nation.”

“I’m sorry about Peterson.” Ian said after he had tried to have his fun. “He was a good man.”

“Peterson made a choice.” I said gravely, “And that choice led to the survival of the majority of his men.” I shook my head sadly. “I’ve already filed for adoption of his son Frank Peterson, and I’m going to finish raising him for the next five years before he becomes an adult.”

“The quest for vengeance often ends in two graves.” Ian Davion said.

“No, it doesn’t.” I interrupted him before he could finish. “Revenge is an important part of human nature, and it often goes hand in hand with Justice. In fact, I can find evidence as a Christian that even Yahweh Himself ordained revenge as necessary. It’s just that said revenge belongs to him if you’re a convert.” I took a breath. “Revenge doesn’t mean you have to be prepared to dig two graves, and it’s meant to serve as closure, a way to ensure that someone who has committed an evil act against you is no longer alive to commit said acts again.” I raised my hand to prevent Ian from interjecting. “Despite what the Tri-Vids will tell you, Revenge isn’t inherently evil, and is in fact one of the most human things there is. The only time it becomes a problem is when you are focused on it to the exclusion of everything else as Mad Max was.”

“I think that we are going to have to agree to disagree on this one.” Ian said after a moment of contemplation. “And I think you’ve spent a little too long on the battlefields old man.”

“I’m only seven years older than you Ian, and when you reach fifty you’ll hope to look this good.” I responded. “Now, I’m going to go collect my forces and start rebuilding the 2nd Kentares.” I paused, “Unless you needed anything else?”

“Actually yes.” Ian stopped me. “Did you get the chance to survey the factories here on St. Ives?”


“Yes,” I responded. “You’ve got two Mothballed factories you might want to Have NAIS and another company take a look at.”

“You don’t want more production?” Ian asked, confused. “Sharpshooter was my first choice.”

“Ian, I am hiring people as fast as we can train and vet them for the things we are already doing,” I said with a sigh. “And with us having to set up the Rampage and Ymir lines I negotiated with Katrina for I’ve got my hands full.” I sagged a bit. “Not to mention the fact that we’re supposed to reopen two shipyards this year, and one next year.”

“Oh,” Ian said as he realized just how much Sharpshooter was doing. “You left one of the Yards over New Rhodes, moved one over to Kentares, and another to Markesan right?”

“Yes Ian, and the New Rhodes yards are going to be opened in December, the Kentares yards this month, and Markesan next year.”

“Well, what factories can be reopened here on St. Ives?” Ian asked. “Reconstruction is one of the things we have found helps with integration.”

“There are a couple of Emperor lines that were mothballed because the XLFE lines were destroyed, and the same with the Pillager.” I shrugged, “I’m not sure why they didn’t downgrade them to a lesser tech base instead of Mothballing them, but if you can get the Gauss Rifle and XLFE feeders back up and running you’ll have two Assault ‘mech factories ready to go.”

“Alright then,” Ian said in response, “Go home and get some rest, you and your people have earned it.”

“You bet your royal ass we have.” I responded. “We’re still available if you need help, but we took some serious losses that will take time to fill.”

“Get together with Frederick Steiner.” Ian suggested. “I think he’s in the same boat right now.”



Kentares IV, March 27th, 3027

“Well, we’re going to have to wait for the remainder of the 1st Marksman to arrive,” I said to Natasha as we finally were able to sit down on the front porch of the Ducal Estate. “I’m keeping Godbolt as CO of the 2nd Kentares Guard, but both Peterson and his XO Hathaway were killed over Sian when the Defender was destroyed.”

“Move Carter up.” Natasha suggested. “She is effective at her job, and is more likely to keep a level head than any of the other people we could move into Peterson’s role.”

“And the fact that She’s been on a training rotation for the last little while should help her get them back up to full strength.” I agreed. “We are going to have to wait on replacing the machines though.” I said with a shrug, “Most of ours are currently promised to other places, and our waiting list only grew longer with us taking what we had available in order to replenish what the Highlanders lost.”

“That is acceptable.” Natasha replied with a raised eyebrow. “We can move some of our non upgraded Ducal Guard machines over to whatever needs to be replaced.”

“I guess you’re right there.” I said after a moment of consideration. “We do still have a large supply of the Omnimechs you brought back with us even if we only let your Marauders keep using theirs.”

“Outfit the entirety of the Ducal Guard with the Omnimechs.” Natasha said. “Unless you desire to keep your Warhammer we can then distribute the salvage that we took from St. Ives to our other units as well in order to keep them at full strength in machinery even if we have to train up more pilots.”

“When did you get so good at logistics Nat?” I asked with a smirk and a twinkle in my eye.

“It must have been when Sheppard drilled it into all of our heads in training.” Natasha responded with a look. “And I would caution you from continuing on this path or you may regret it.”

“I give.” I raised my hands in faux surrender. “Now we need to go check up on Frank, he’s been locked in his fathers house since the funeral.”

“Death comes for us all one day.” Natasha said introspectively. “And it is often only in someone’s death that you acutely feel their presence missing.”

“It doesn’t help that I’ve basically been raising him since Francesca died.” I responded sadly. “Peterson was a good officer, but he too often did not act as a good father.”

“It is the truly sad thing about his departure from this life.” Natasha said as we walked back inside. “That he had truly started to reconcile before his passing.”

“You can’t afford to miss an opportunity to spend time with loved ones.” I agreed. “You never know if that might be the last time that you see them. “

 

[Bear Ribs]

Somehow I just can't see putting Romano back in charge of any part of the former CC working out well. Not even because of her memetic craziness (I give Romano quite a bit more credit than many) but because there's going to be too much of a temptation for random former Mask agents or the like to try to rebuild the confederation with her as a figurehead even if she doesn't agree.

That said as a bit of a Romano fan I can't overstate how pleased I am she's actually getting a role in a story besides "Bonkers mad idiot."

 

[The Whispering Monk]

but because there's going to be too much of a temptation for random former Mask agents or the like to try to rebuild the confederation with her as a figurehead even if she doesn't agree.

This is likely part of the reason as well. A different kind of honeypot to lure the last of the Mask out of hiding.

 

[Bear Ribs]

This is likely part of the reason as well. A different kind of honeypot to lure the last of the Mask out of hiding.

Didn't think of that angle. That makes sense.

 

[The Whispering Monk]

Didn't think of that angle. That makes sense.

It's also one that Romano may have suggested herself.

 

[MarkWarrior]

Seeing as quoting seems to crash the site I’m having to reply to everything in this format.
Romano didn’t suggest it,(Quintus Allard did) and it’s only a temporary position while things settle down in what used to be the Capellan Confederation. After a few years as military governor she’s going to be headed back to Northwind. She is married to Timothy Senn in this canon after all.