Scavenged Restoration 84 (Patreon)

Commissioned by RoyalTwinFangs

Scavenged Restoration

Chapter 84: Interludes

-VB-

General Frederick Steiner gritted his teeth as his mech rode through a SRM bombardment, an upgraded Atlas that possessed ferro-fibrous armor, double heat sinks, and even Triple Strength Myomers (he insisted that the Periphery invaders wouldn’t know how to counter it).

Ever since the Battle of Blackjack Star where the Lyran Commonwealth scored a monumental victory against the Clans, the periphery invaders have been running roughshod over them, despite the fact that their most important warships, mechwarriors, and assets have left the Inner Sphere. 

The previous patterns of the Clans demanding trials no longer occurred in Lyran space, while Trials were supposedly still happening in Combine space. 

And because of whatever it was that the Clans decided, he found himself fighting two entire “garrison galaxies” that Clan Wolf  had left behind on Vulcan instead of the usual battalion he expected to need to contend with. 

Even if the garrison galaxy did not possess the best mechwarriors and mechs, they outnumbered his RCT by a factor of two, even after including his mechanized regiment to the calculation.

It was only because the average tonnage of his mechs were heavy that he was surviving through this assault. 

“I need those damn artillery strikes in front of my position now!” Frederick ordered over the comms even as he whirled his Atlas around to punch a daring Hunchback.

Hunchbacks were the most numerous of the mechs he’s encountered among the garrison galaxies so far, and they were proving to be a problem. Clan Wolf had been liberal in giving Hunchbacks to their garrison mechwarriors.

According to reports, Clan Wolf was supposed to be one of the premier Clans. 

‘Like the Wolf’s Dragoons.’

It was … suspected by the leaders of the FedCom even before Jaime Wolf came up to them once the Clan Invasion began. That, technically, he had been spying on the Inner Sphere as a whole before Khan Ward, the predecessor of the current khan of Clan Wolf, released them to help support the Inner Sphere. 

‘Fat lot of good they did,’ he snorted before grimacing again at another swarm of SRMs. 

He glared at the Archer that’s been spamming that at him.

What kind of a lunatic builds SRMs into an Archer?! 

“I’m coming for you!” he roared and charged into the fray. 

He batted aside a Commando and slammed into the Archer. He fired off his AC/20 straight into its waist and watched the mech almost snap in half. 

Then he fired off his SRMs.

“Take a load of your own medicine!” 

The Clan mechwarrior died screaming. 

He stopped and looked around the battlefield. 

If it was just the mechs, then he wouldn’t be worried. 

No, the problem was in the Elementals. They were too small and crept around the battlefield like cockroaches, picking off smaller mechs with ease and reinforcing their allies against larger foes. If it hadn’t been for a heavy investment into anti-infantry/anti-light mech that the Commonwealth had made in preparation for a possible Capellan assault on their worlds, then this battle would have gone far worse for them.

As it was, he watched flamers, machineguns, and SRMs pick off Elementals that couldn’t get behind their mech allies in time. 

But even as they fought, it was clear to Frederick that a single RCT would not be enough from this point on. This was a goddamn agri-world, for God’s sake! If this was the kind of resistance that he was facing on a fucking agri-world, then he dreaded what he would find on worlds like Tamar.

He would need a minimum of three RCTs before hitting any of them. 

‘Next time,’ he growled mentally. ‘I’m going to bomb them from orbit if these furries are nowhere close to a population center!’

And then another Hunchback was running up to him, no doubt in an attempt to do him in with its UAC/20, something that the Clans had that Lyrans like himself were very keen on having.

Still, the absolute gall of the Clan mechwarriors to think that they could just run up to him like this in the middle of a battle!

He turned his torso around and aimed his own AC/20 at the Hunchback.

“You’re too young to fight me, whippersnapper!”

BOOM!!!

-VB-

Jaime Wolf knew that he should be doing something. 

The Clans had invaded as he had been forewarned, and the Inner Sphere was fighting. 

Even the Capellans who had nothing to do with it offered one of their royals and a third of their entire naval fleet to aid their allies. 

… And it also cemented his position as the continued commanding officer of the Wolf’s Dragoons. His soldiers saw what the Capellans had done to Clan Smoke Jaguar (good riddance to bad rubbish), and the fact that he had kept his people from suffering a potentially similar fate decades ago by deliberately not letting them fight the Capellans during the Lyran War. 

But he did agree with his warriors that he had played it safe for far too long. 

The Clans were at their doorstep! They should be fighting them! 

Natasha was one of the biggest proponents of that stance, and he was inclined to agree.

“We’re going to join the frontlines.”

That got the entire council to turn toward him in a snap.

And then they turned to look at each other.

They knew how the Wolf’s Dragoons operated since their scuffle with the Capellans under Chancellor Max and the Draconis Combine under Coordinator Takashi. It meant that a third of the Dragoons would remain behind at a minimum, and in the current state that the company found itself in, that meant only two regiments could sally forth to join the war against the Clans. 

“Natasha and her Black Widows will also participate in the trials.”

That made a few of the other colonels and majors grimace while Natasha, who was standing in the corner drinking her beer, grinned like the cat that caught the canary. 

He didn’t sigh, even though he wanted to. “We will set time tomorrow to organize the trials and then hold them overmorrow. Does anyone have objections to this schedule?” he asked as he looked around. 

There were none.

“Good. Then all of you are dismissed. I am sure you will need to alert your regiments.” Then he paused and looked to the Home Guard and the Aerospace Command. “This includes your people as well. Alexander, Beowulf, and Darius will remain here on Outreach along with a third of the jumpships, but the rest will be given permission to join the fight. I leave the specifics to your Fleet colonel.”

And that got finally got the officers of the Aerospace Command and Home Guard riled up. 

Fleet Colonel Issola Chandra, the woman in charge of the Aerospace Command, looked at him with deadpan eyes.

A brief exchange occurred with just facial expressions.

‘Why must you do this to me?’

‘Someone has to deal with it, and you’ve been asking to fight for years.’

‘Not like this.’

‘Deal with it.’

The Wolf’s Dragoons were joining the fight, and if they were lucky, then they would only fight worthy opponents. 

The meeting came to an end shortly after with how quickly each of the majors and colonels wanted to go back to their regiments to spread the good news and organize themselves. 

It was then that Natasha came up to him.

“... Only two regiments to keep Outreach under protection?” she asked casually. 

He hummed. “It will be more than what most have for their own worlds, including the Great Houses,” he replied. 

But the problem was that Outreach was a single jump away from the Capellans. 

And the Capellans were not most Great Houses. 

Under Chancellor William Liao, they have shown time and time again that the Capellans had survived this long not because of their leaders but in spite of them. It had taken a single good leader for them to make the kind of comeback that was already written down in history and to be forever remembered alongside the likes of Alexander the Great and Alexander Kerensky.

And while that Capellan Confederation had sent help to fight the Clans, the vast majority of their war materials remained firmly within the confederation while the Federated Suns sent close to half of their soldiers to fight and die on Lyran worlds. 

If a war broke out…

If the Capellans chose violence over unity…

But they wouldn’t. 

Because, by this point, the Inner Sphere had learned that when Chancellor William said something, he meant it, and he was firmly keeping his people away from Terra.

Speaking of Terra, he knew that their fleet had jumped out of the Free Trade Corridor towards the Clans, but no news of their arrival or appearance had circulated. Which was an achievement in and of itself considering that the fleet they sent had nearly thirty warships, a dozen additional jumpships, and close to two dozen pocket warships.

He wondered where they might be.

-VB-

After a nice and long inhale, Precentor John Anderson blew out smoke from his lips as he stared at the world below him. 

He was in charge of the First Com Guard Expeditionary Force. 

Under him were twenty seven warships: two Cameron-class battlecruisers, two Black Lion-class battlecruisers, two Aegis-class heavy cruisers, six Dante-class frigates, four Lola III-class destroyers, and ten Vincent-class corvettes. The twenty-seventh ship was his flagship and the pride and joy of Com Guard and ComStar, the new Blake-class Battleship. 

It was … a collaboration. Of a sort. With the Capellan Confederation. 

After all, it used many parts from the Capellan Confederation and thus it was a collaboration. Many of their scientists worked on it, even if they didn’t know they were working with ComStar. And through this collaboration, they learned how to make, or at least mimic, what the Capellans did with the nanochips.

As for how… Terra still had many educated peoples, after all, so it was not too difficult, and their hidden worlds provided the wealth of materials needed to create this monstrosity. 

And what a monstrosity it was. 

He and other precentors had feared that it would be used to protect Terra from the Great Houses when they inevitably came calling with their need to conquer Terra, but it turned out not to be true. 

Instead, the Star League Exodus had returned. As savages. Barbarians. 

Worse than the Scavenger Lords.

It was … It was truly disheartening. 

But being disheartened did not change the fact that there was a need for ComStar to act. They were the true leaders of the Inner Sphere, and if they did not show that to its people, then they would forever follow the Great Houses while dismissing ComStar’s place.

That was why the Primus and the First Circuit had sent him and the First Expeditionary Fleet out.

To show the Inner Sphere that ComStar and Com Guard would not remain idle while its people were in danger! 

But they would not fight like brutes and idiots of the Scavenger Lords. 

It was why, instead of simply engaging Clan Wolf and Clan Ghost Bear, who were the closest to reaching Terra, they came out here. 

To the periphery.

“We found them, precentor.”

John paused in his ruminations.

And slowly, his lips split wide open into a feral grin.

“So this was where the clans were hiding their collaborative logistics hub, hmm?” he hummed out loud as he slowly stood up from his chair. Because, there, in front of him (according to his sensors) was a great fleet of jumpships and a makeshift space station used to service those jumpships. “Board and seize them all for ComStar!”

“For ComStar!” his crew saluted back, and he watched as a dozen pocket warships rumbled forward. 

Why fight the Clans face to face and suffer unimaginable losses when ComStar can simply cut off the blood flow of their invasion force? 

Why fight them like the Scavenger Lords when ComStar can render them helpless?

-VB-

It felt like the entire planet was here to watch their princess disembark. Millions of people filled every single corner of the space port that was safe to occupy. There were thousands of cameras pointing at the dropship. 

And not too far away from it was Chancellor William Liao.

As the Princess-class dropship lowered its ramp, everyone facing the insides of that dropship saw a woman standing proudly in the middle of her honor guards. 

And as she took a step out and began her descent, the entire space port erupted into a cheer. 

“SHENGLI TIANJIE GONGZHU (Victorious Heavenly Princess)!” 

The phrase repeated. The chaotic discordant cheer coalesced. 

“SHENGLI TIANJIE GONGZHU !” 

And the Capellan people roared out their champion’s new title as one.

“SHENGLI TIANJIE GONGZHU !” 

And she waved to the crowd. 

Cheers broke out again. 

And finally, she came before her father and knelt. As if all of the cheering had been a lie, silence descended with the drop of a pin. Absolute and intense in its presence.

“Father,” her voice echoed out, captured by microphones set up by audio crews hours before her arrival for this moment. “I’ve returned victorious.”

“Daughter.” A pause. “Welcome home.”

And just like that, cheers broke out again into a wild ruckus that shook the ground and trembled the air itself with the sheer joy and exultation of the people.

“SHENGLI TIANJIE GONGZHU!”