14
Chapter 12
-VB-
Janos Marik stared at the reports from SAFE's agents on the ground, military intelligence provided by the Capellans, and reports of his own military.
Obviously, he didn't have the means to conquer any substantial Lyran worlds. The damnable Home Defense Act was keeping him tied up completely, and Duchess Catherine Humphreys of the Duchy of Andurien was doing her utmost to keep the Free Worlds League out of the so-called Fourth Succession War.
It was obvious why she was doing this. She had been a vehement opposition to the Kapteyn Accords, even if it didn't really change anything, because her Duchy of Andurien would stop growing if they and the Capellans were forced into a peace treaty. The duchy grew under her by many means, but one of her calling card was for a "better shared defense" against the Capellan Confederation. With the Kapteyn Accords removing that particular threat, some of the worlds under her duchy moved to secede from her control.
So for her, helping the Capellans in their hour of need was the last thing she wanted from the wider Free Worlds League.
Oh, he knew what she was planning. He would be a fool to not see it.
SAFE may not be the best or even middling civilian intelligence agency in the Inner Sphere, but it was still a semi-competent one. They brought him documents upon documents detailing military movements within the duchy towards the Capellan border.
Janos knew that she intended to hit them and take their worlds once the Capellans were at their lowest.
But he also knew that she didn't know about the Capellan's growing industrial might. In the short few years that William Liao had been the chancellor of the Capellan Confederation, he had focused heavily on revitalizing the Capellan's dying industries.
And succeeded.
Officially, the Capellan Confederation had 45 mech regiments.
Unofficially, the confederation was making half a regiment a month.
How the hell they achieved this SAFE could not find out.
But he had an idea.
Or rather, everyone in the Inner Sphere had a good idea.
'He really was willing to make peace with the Lyrans and the Suns,' Janos thought as he thought back to the small memory core that Chancellor Liao crushed underneath his foot. He knew for a fact that the leader who managed to revitalized his nation kept copies of that memory core. And that the memory core he crushed had to be a copy in and of itself.
Which meant that the Liaos found a memory core containing Lostech. Worse, they found military lostech that could be used to fix their broken factories. What else would explain the near 50% increase in mech production across the Capellan Confederation?
If the Lyrans or the Suns got their hands on that, then their larger population and industrial base would be retooled… And turned against him and the Free Worlds League.
If the Capellans didn't have that memory core, then he would have been more than happy to let the fools knock themselves dizzy while the League sat back, rested, and enjoyed the show.
This was ultimately the reason why he couldn't afford to not help the Capellans, even if William was not his father and not the one who turned his own brother against him.
The problem, once again, came down to the Home Defense Act and the border provinces' unwillingness to help in "a foreign war."
Dumb motherfuckers.
No, not dumb.
Foolish, shortsighted, and fractious motherfuckers.
He leaned back into his office chair and felt it bouncing lightly after reaching its maximum backward tilt.
He looked up at the office ceiling and hummed.
Then there was a knock on the door.
His secretary came in, walked all the way around the long office filled with posh furnitures, bookcases and books, and aesthetically pleasing filing cabinets that served no purpose whatsoever, and came up to his right.
"Sir, there is a man verified to be a member of the Maskirovka of the Capellan Confederation waiting for you. He claims that he has a message from the chancellor to you that he could not allow ComStar to read."
He blinked.
So that's a thing.
---
Theodore Kurita stared at the Maskirovka agent standing at attention in front of him after having given the Combine's customary kowtow.
He may be young. He may not be politically acute as some of his peers or even his elders.
But he was not stupid.
The Maskirovka coming here to pay homage to him and not the Coordinator signalled who the Capellan Confederation saw the future of the Draconis Combine.
It also set a very dangerous precedent that could cause … problems.
But he couldn't just ignore an agent sent by the Chancellor of the Capellan Confederation. Aside from the fact that the Draconis Combine was a nominal ally of the confederation in the latest war burning away at the Inner Sphere, then it was also that he, the heir to the Chrysanthemum Throne, could not be seen turning away a guest without a good reason.
And he had no good reason right now, aside from the fact that he was in the middle of a campaign in the Rasalhague Military District to fight off the invading Lyrans, who like always, lacked a decisive leader to take advantage of their scarily competent subordinates.
The chancellor probably knew what he was doing, and in a way, this act made Theodore question just how deeply the Maskirovka infiltrated the Draconis Combine if they came to him and not his father with whatever important message they carried which they refused to send with ComStar's HPG network and how they knew he would be here on Vega to time it perfectly with his arrival.
"Tell me," he began. "What does the chancellor want to say to the Draconis Combine that he sent you to me, a servant of the Coordinator?" he asked.
"The Celestial Wisdom sends you his greetings, Prince Kurita," the agent began with a lyrical tone to her voice. "I am Gyu, a high ranking member of the Maskirovka. I carry with me the words of the Chancellor and a gift," she said and slid an envelope toward him. "This humble one bids you to read the Chancellor's wisdom."
Still a little apprehensive of the competent Maskirovka and the utterly insane timing, he watched as one of his samurai picked up the letter and inspected it for potential treachery before handing it to him with both of his hands. He took the letter and opened it up.
The fine paper and handwritten letter started off rather simply.
"To my future peer of the Inner Sphere," he began.
---
Janos began to read. "To Janos Marik, my peer across the border. It has been four months since the Fourth Succession War was declared upon the rest of the Inner Sphere by the vainglorious Federated Suns and the Lyran Commonwealth. My realm is under siege and yet I do not see my allies of the Kapteyn Accords fighting as they have promised."
He snorted. Of course, he wasn't fighting hard. Why would he? He may not want the FedCom to win but he also didn't want a rejuvenated and stronger Capellan Confederation at his borders.
And that was before his own people dragged their feet, thinking that the war far away wouldn't soon be a war at their front doors.
"Then allow me make my case clear for your undivided attention and cooperation.
"Conquer more than two dozen worlds during the duration of this war from the Lyrans -."
---
"-and I will hand over a copy of the memory core that I crushed upon that wedding hall. It will contain everything I stated before, and my agent in front of you has a lesser copy that you can take to see that I truly do have the civilian lostech of the Star League that you can use to revitalize yourselves.
With hopes of a better future for us all,
William Liao, Chancellor of the Capellan Confederation."
Theodore set the letter down and his eyes drifted back up.
The agent, seeing him focus upon her, turned to look at one of the bodyguards. "I will bring out a datacore on my person. Is this acceptable?"
His samurai looked to him for direction.
Theodore nodded.
The bodyguard nodded.
The woman reached -.
'How shameless,' he thought without looking as she reached into the space between her voluptuous breasts and pulled out a rather sizable "datacore."
… Wait, how did that even fit in there? Her breasts didn't even shrink after she pulled it out.
Huh?
"Bring in my most able … scholar," Theodore commanded, and within five minutes, a man came to answer his call, kowtowing right next to the agent. "You are…?"
"Hai, Prince Kurita. This one is called Marcus Herrikky. This one is a doctor of mechanical engineering and molecular biology."
An accomplished individual, then, especially since he didn't have a single wrinkle on him.
"Did you bring a noteputer?"
"Hai."
"Inspect this and its contents for me."
The 'datacore' went around the room until it came within the man's hands. He found a way to chip the datacore into his noteputer (the datacore had an extendable cord) and perused what it was showing on the noteputer's small hologram.
And the more he saw, the more he grew stiff.
"M-My prince, this -!" he began but quickly shut himself up.
"Is it lostech?"
"Y-yes, but there are many parts of it that have been blurred out or outright missing. I-." He gulped and then his eyes drifted to the woman. He bowed quickly. "Yes, it is lostech but with too many parts of it having been removed, I will not be able to make use of it immediately or in the near future."
"I see. You are dismissed."
And then he was gone, leaving the datacore behind with only a brief hesitance.
"... This is a big gamble on your chancellor's part," he began. "Especially since he came to me and not my father, who I am loyal to," he stressed with narrowed eyes.
"Our chancellor sees much, Prince Kurita. He asked me to give you the second letter if you showed interest in his offer."
A second letter?
He took a deep breath in. "I will discuss this with my father. But I am personally interested in it. If my father allows, then I would gladly go on the offensive against the distracted Federated Suns."
She nodded and pulled out another letter. This one did not, thankfully, come out from between her breasts but from a sleeve in her arms.
Man, where was all of this coming from? Was she stage magician as part of her cover?
He took the letter after his samurai checked it, again, and this one…
He read it.
And read it again.
Before slamming it down on the table.
"How did you and the Maskirovka get access to the royal records?!" he roared with eyes wide open and his mien twisted into a wrathful snarl.
He was not angry.
No, he was fearful.
Because the letter's content described something that made him fearful.
But explained so much about his father's changes since his stroke.
"Our chancellor sees all," the Maskirovka agent replied calmly. "He is the Chancellor who truly fits his title, the Celestial Wisdom." She paused. "Prince Kurita, I shall be in the city for as long as you need for the reply. If there is nothing else…?"
"You are dismissed."
She bowed deeper before leaving backwards.
Skilled.
Once the door closed and his samurais gave him the all clear, he nearly grabbed the small desk in front of him to throw it in a fit of rage.
Not only was the entire Draconis Combine humiliated by having the Maskirovka infiltrate the royal palace on Luthien but for other state to know of their weakness?!
It was …
Instead of flying into a fit of rage that would make him look like his father, Theodore took a deep breath and let it out slowly.
"I must talk with my father."
Chapter 13
-VB-
When the Denizens Get Uppity
By Arnold H. Ritzherald, 3080, New Avalon 7th District Press
Chapter 4: The Perfect Storm
The Battle for Styk (3028-3030) is considered by many within the Federated Commonwealth's military circle as the Trauma Ground, and even to this day, veterans of the battle recall harrowing experiences that leaves many with flashbacks after the interview if not during it. Shell shock and paranoia remain rampant among the Styk mechwarrior veterans as well, but they are also the least disrespectful of the mechwarriors in the Federated Commonwealth's military ranks.
And why wouldn't they be? Styk isn't called the Trauma Ground for no reason. It is there that so many Federated Suns mechwarriors met their ends not fighting against another mechwarrior but fighting against swarms of militia that refused to give up.
Unlike all other planetary conquests that took place before, First Prince Hanse Davion chose to enact Reintegration Act of 3028, which was passed two months before the declaration of the Fourth Succession War, and this law prevented the first generation of new residents of the conquered planets from becoming citizens of the Federated Suns and then the Federated Commonwealth. While the law itself was made to prevent infiltration of foreign agents deep into Suns' society as freedom to travel was one of the rights of the Federated Suns citizens, the intensified war and the unexpected stiff resistance of the Capellan Confederation led to many military governors to use the Reintegration Act of 3028 to flagrantly violate the rights afforded to all people within the Federated Suns in the name of "catching spies, insurgents, and hidden elements" as stated by Major Reginald Won-Fagarak of the AFFS in his brief tenure as the military governor of Ronel.
His tenure was marked by executions of forty-one thousand nine hundred eighty-eight arrested civilians, most of whom were rather found to have no direct ties to any insurgency. In truth, Ronel didn't have an insurgency except pockets of militia survivors who fought back for three months longer than Ronel had been conquered.
When this event was unveiled by the Maskirovka, it became known as "Capellan Kentares" to the public despite how few civilians died in comparison to the Kentares Massacre. While the executions were not done with swords like the Combine had with Federated Suns citizens, leaked photos of men, women, and even small teenagers lined up against the walls or in the process of being buried after execution shocked people nonetheless. The Capellan Confederation used this as the phenomenal propaganda tool that it was and galvanized the remaining populace across Tikonov and Sarna Commonality into becoming belligerent fighters against any and all Federated Suns advance.
Though no true and accurate estimate of the Ronel Massacre could be given on how it impacted the Fourth Succession War, even the most pessimistic scholar agrees that at least another half a dozen systems might have fallen to the Federated Suns had the Ronel Massacre not happen.
Major Reginald Won-Fagarak was, of course, court martialed for his malicious mishandling of Ronel, found guilty, and quietly executed away from public eyes before the Fourth Succession War came to a close. For it was this one man who forever ruined the chance of a peaceful integration of former Capellan citizens into the Federated Suns and would sow the seeds of Capellan reconquest.
He was to the Capellans what Amos Foulough was to the Taurians.
And Styk was being contested when the news of Ronel Massacre became public.
It was that day on 3029 April 5th that Tormano Liao, brother to Chancellor William Liao, gave his fateful "Rise with Me" speech.
"Ronel surrendered peacefully after losing their garrison. But look at what happened! The Suns came and massacre a full hundredth of their entire population! Let this be a lesson to all Capellans who think a quick peace is on the table!
"They will destroy us. The people who the Suns killed on Ronel were pillars of their communities!
"They will enslave us! They made it into law that no Capellan will ever be a citizen of the Federated Suns, regardless of the work one might put in!
"They will erase us! They will destroy our culture. Our pride. Our family. Our communities. It has already happened and they emulated their hated enemy, the Draconis Combine, by killing our brothers and sisters with their own hands!
"So rise! Grab your rifle! Grab your launchers! You do not fight just for yourself. You fight for your family, your community, and the Capellan state! Rise so that they cannot stomp you into the ground!
"Capellans, rise with me against those who seek our deaths!"
Whether or not Tormano Liao got his facts correct remains irrelevant. His speech, broadcasted across all Capellan worlds, pushed the already fanatical populace into action… and belief.
Capellans came to genuinely believe that there would be no mercy. They believed that their beloved leaders - the pillars of their communities - will be executed for merely existing. That their children will be executed on the suspicion of association as those teenagers on Ronel had been. That they would be "erased" from history.
On Styk…
It became the Trauma Ground.
For both Capellans and the Suns.
-VB-
"... Is it done?"
A seemingly normal and utterly mundane man stood before Michael Hasek-Davion.
"It is," the man responded to his employer's question. "Of course, all evidence related to you and me will disappear, and the major will find himself richer after confiscating the wealth of the richer Capellans… and publicly known to all for his actions soon."
"Good, good," Michael let out a sigh of relief.
This had been a very far-fetched plan but it worked out.
To think that the Capellans would be so useful in his plans… Everything from their chancellor's presentation with the fake memory core (it had to be practiced) at Hanse's wedding to the unorthodox defense of his state was working for him, Michael Hasek-Davion.
All of it, after all, was proving to be a fertile ground for him to sow the seeds of Davion dissidence.
He initially wanted to meet up with Chancellor Liao himself to determine how he can best use the chancellor to usurp Hanse Davion. But even without needing to meet him, the chancellor was doing that already!
The people of the Federated Suns wasn't a monolith, after all, and even among Davion supporters, there were those who weren't as strict with their support as others.
Their monarch's inability to get the memory core that would have been handed to them on a silver platter grated many people, especially those whose worlds suffered most from technological degradation. People who didn't like the Davions hated him more for declaring war. Why wouldn't they? Many of them were people who barely survived on their outback worlds.
Not only that, he, as one of the premier nobles and military generals of the Federated Suns in his role as the Minister of the Capellan March, learned that the Capellans had found out about the war preparation a full year before its declaration, which lead to the current grinding stalemate across the Tikonov Commonality!
One after another, Hanse made mistakes, and Michael profited from them.
Already, he managed to make connections with Davion supporters who increasingly started to question whether the current Davion was the right person fit to rule the Federated Suns. Not many but enough to keep him motivated and advanced this path forward.
Knock knock.
He lightly glanced over his shoulder and turned his chair around. "Yes?"
The door to his manor office clicked open just a little to show his secretary, a man he trusted utterly and who had proven his loyalty time and time again.
"Sir, there is someone here to see you. He says that he's a messenger courier."
Michael glanced at the spy-for-hire, who gave him a nod and left.
"Send them in," he said after a minute.
A clean-shaven man with silver hair walked in. He was a man who had aged gracefully, and looked almost regal in the simple suit vest, long sleeve shirt, business pants, and dress shoes.
"And you are…?"
The man cleared his throat.
"Before I talk, I would ask if this office is secure, Your Grace."
Michael raised an eyebrow before raising a hand up and gesturing to his secretary, who had been watching from the doorway.
The secretary stepped in, closed the door behind him, and pressed a button somewhere on his person.
And just like that, his office was surrounded by a temporary faraday cage.
"We are secure."
The man bowed.
"Thank you, Your Grace. Allow me to introduce myself. I am a nameless member … of the Maskirovka," he said bluntly. Michael immediately stiffened but relaxed as the self-proclaimed Maskirovka agent reached into his suit and brought out an envelope. "And the Chancellor of the Capellan Confederation has an offer for you."
Michael cautiously took the letter and opened it.
He read the letter… and definitely did not allow himself to smile.
'So the Maskirovka's intelligence operation and discovery of the war preparation was not a fluke,' he thought to himself. Because how else would Chancellor Liao know of his ambition and even some of the acts he took in the past? 'William Liao is far more dangerous than his father,' he thought with a bit of a shiver.
"And what could he possibly offer me to persuade me?" he asked in return. He glanced at his secretary, who pressed another button.
A silent EMP burst. Small enough that it would only echo within his chamber but strong enough to knock out any and all electronics.
If the Maskirovka tried to get a recording of this conversation, then they would be sorely disappointed.
The "nameless" Maskirovka smiled.
It was an emotionless smile. A cold smile. A weightless gesture.
"Chancellor Liao is willing to divulge information on an SLDF cache you will be able to get your hands on."
He froze before slowly looking up.
He stared even as his mind wracked for puzzle pieces and information and -.
It clicked.
The "fake" memory core.
It wasn't a fake. It was real.
Chancellor Liao had access to a SLDF memory core.
How else would he know the location of an SLDF cache? He must have found a SLDF cache himself that had the core… which might have had locations on other caches.
Suddenly, he realized that this offer might just be something he needed. Not just to use it for himself but for the future. If the Capellans found multiple caches, then they would have SLDF battlemechs and technology. If they survived this war with more of their worlds than not, then they would be in a good position to strike back against the Federated Suns in the next conflict.
And his Capellan March was closest target.
If only to arm himself up, he needed to accept this.
"What … does the chancellor of the Capellan Confederation want in exchange for that information?"
The man's smile hadn't changed, but it suddenly looked far more sinister than before.
"The Chancellor wishes for a very simple thing, Your Grace. He wishes your cooperation in infiltrating Kathil."
"Kathil? Not the staging grounds along the Tikonov Commonality?"
The messenger smiled but didn't offer any response to his probing question.
Kathil… What was in Kathil?
… Oh.
He let out a chuckle. "You really want to cripple us, huh?" he asked. Kathil … it was the largest dropship and jumpship yard that the Federated Suns still maintained with their ever-regressing technology.
"I am merely the messenger. If you desire no part in it, then I will leave with no one the wiser," the Maskirovka agent replied. "What will your answer be, Your Grace?"
-VB-
Theodore Kurita looked at the Maskirovka agent.
"We accept."
-VB-
Janos Marik glared at the spy.
"I accept."
-VB-
Michael Hasek-Davion could imagine Hanse Davion's fall.
He couldn't afford to not take this chance.
"I accept."
-VB-
A/N: Because it isn't enough that his enemies are starting to work together, his self-declared political rival was also sabotaging him.
Chapter 14
-VB-
On Tikonov, it was a rainy day for Tikograd.
A Thunderbolt carrying the unit emblem of the 1st Chesterton Voltigeurs stomped forward before opening fire with its LRM-15. The large barrel on its left shoulder flared and roared as fifteen rockets shout out of it one by one and flew across the scarred, charred, and now barren ground between the walls of Tikograd and the enemies threatening its people.
Their target?
An Enforcer.
The medium mech buckled and swayed as it tried to dodge the rockets, but the LRMs seemed to follow him. A few missed, but the rest struck the Enforcer dead in the right torso. The ablative armor tore away with each rocket detonation before the final rocket punched through and struck something deeper inside its structure.
There was a hiss.
The Enforcer's mechwarrior panicked.
The mech raised its AC/10 and fired once at the Thunderbolt before the ammunition in its right torso finally cooked off and exploded. The explosion tossed both the mech's right arm with its AC/10 and the mech itself away in opposite directions. The arm crashed loudly before rolling away in the mud. The medium mech fell backward and crashed into the ground.
The Thunderbolt wasted no chance and fired all of its lasers into the enemy mech's head cockpit.
There was a scream in the radio waves before the Enforcer stilled.
From within the Thunderbolt, Pavel Ridzik, the Strategic Military Director of the Capellan Confederation Armed Forces, let out an explosive breath of air as he allowed himself and his mech to rest momentarily while the 1st battalion of the 1st Chesterton Voltigeurs regiment streamed forward in their light and medium mechs to take advantage of the opening he'd created for them.
The heavier mechs of the Federated Suns bearing the unit emblem of the 8th Crucis Lancers tried to patch up the hole in their ranks, but they weren't fast enough.
A pair of Watchman charged forward recklessly and each slammed their bodies into a Phoenix Hawk and Awesome assault mech to stop their movement. A trio of their comrades in Firebees took advantage of this and jumped onto the Suns' mechs with full intent to crush the cockpits.
The opening remained, and a company of Cicadas, Firebees, and Vindicators rushed in to fill the gap and separate the 8th Crucis Lancers' battleline.
The Watchman who tackled Awesome couldn't last against the assault mech. The Awesome swung its arms and tossed the lighter mech away before opening up with its triple PPCs.
Pavel gritted his teeth as the militiaman inside the Watchman made one final call out before the PPCs struck his center torso.
"FOR THE CHANCEL-!"
The mech exploded and cut the man's last words short into static.
The Firebees DFA'ing on the Awesome returned the favor quickly by opening up with their SRMs directly on the Awesome's cockpit before they crashed into the Awesome.
Despite being heavily armored, over a dozen SRMs directly exploding on its head before a pair of feet landing on it utterly flattened the damaged head and killed the pilot inside.
The Awesome keeled over.
On paper, this was good.
Exchanging a medium militia mech for an assault mech double the militia mech's tonnage was an unmitigated success.
In reality, Pavel felt like he was failing his people.
The news of the Ronel Massacre had reached them, and the weak-willed militia had become … radicalized.
Despite his strict orders to not sacrifice themselves which was also the order of the chancellor, militia mechwarriors and infantry would jump to their death if they calculated that they could take out double or triple their tonnage. With how so many of the Suns' mechs were weak from months of guerilla warfare they faced on top of these open battles, their efforts usually got them the kills they desired.
The Suns equally gave no mercy.
More than a few of their mechwarriors had gone out of their way to summarily execute surrendering Capellan soldiers, and released video footages of these executions - sometimes recorded by far away Capellans and sometimes found on damaged Davion mech's battleROMs - only encouraged his soldiers to go above and beyond the call of duty.
Pavel just wished they would stop dying in the process.
"Colonel Ridzik, we're through!" Colonel Alanna Dickersenn of the 1st Chesterton Voltigeurs reported.
"I want all of the Davion mechs dead," he hissed. "Encircle them."
From the cut into the middle of the battleline, the 1st battalion quickly spread out and flanked the 8th Crucis Lancers while the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th Battalions kept up the pressure alongside the 7th Tikonov Militia regiment.
The 8th Crucis Lancers were too heavy to run away and got completely surrounded before they could mount a proper counterattack.
Pavel watched while occasionally firing off his large laser and LRMs as the muddy open field became the 8th Crucis Lancers' graveyard.
And this happened because the militia mechwarriors chose to sacrifice their lives to prevent the gap from closing.
Such bravery…
He wanted to give them the award they deserved, goddamnit! If they were servitors, then he would make sure their families would get the citizenship he earned them!
Then he heard a wet laugh.
"{D-Director!}" Colonel Rudolph Baxter of the Arianna Grenadiers called over the radio. "{Reinforcements! The Chancellor sent us reinforcements!}"
Pavel blinked, his mind momentarily drifting away from the battlefield. "Who is it?" he quickly asked before shaking himself and getting back to the battle, narrowly dodging a large laser to his left shoulder (or did the enemy miss?).
"{It's the Big Mac! The Chancellor sent us three regiments of the Big Mac!}"
Pavel's eyes widened.
The Chancellor … he hadn't abandoned Tikonov. He answered his call for reinforcement!
In a rare moment of emotional outburst, he activated his radio on all frequency.
"Soldiers! The Chancellor has sent us reinforcements!" he roared. "Tikonov stands!" And charged into the battlefield.
On the muddy field outside Tikograd, the three battalions of the 8th Crucis Lancers met their end while their comrades fled the suicidal Capellan mechwarriors.
They would be hounded back to their base by ambushing Firebees and militia infantry. After the battle, they would have only a few things to say about the battle and the retreat.
Bees were everywhere in the trees.
-VB-
Tormano Liao did not become the de facto commander of the entire planetary defense.
He did, however, retain his position as the commander of Hegemony Bay's militia and one of the senior commanders on Styk still alive. And it was because he was the commander of a combined arms militia regiment that he understood the Capellan Confederation was fighting a losing battle here on Styk.
"Nine more regiments?" he hissed out in disbelief. "Does the Davion want to turn Styk into a meat grinder…?!"
Because Hanse Davion had apparently decided that he wanted Styk at all cost.
"I just hope my brother is taking advantage of this," he mumbled to himself.
He didn't know which regiments the enemy reinforcements were, but nine mech regiments when their most elite heavy mech regiment was already here spelled doom for him and the defense.
He closed his eyes in the underground bunker room where he and a few of the most trusted officers used as their command center.
A major, who technically outranked him, shuffled where he stood.
"Speak up, major," he said tiredly.
"Shouldn't we consider … retreat?" he asked with a gulp.
Tormano looked up at the brave man.
Had this been during his father's reign, then the major here would have been executed for cowardice for suggesting retreat before his superior officer did. Of course, the logic behind that had been his father's insistence that only he, the Chancellor, had the right to call a retreat from a Capellan world.
He couldn't tell if the officer was brave or his brother's speeches and promises made people feel more inclined to speak up.
Or did this officer just trust him enough to expose himself like this? Even if the military reforms his brother and sister have been pushing had a rapid effect on the military, it took time for people to change how they spoke, behaved, and thought.
"... My brother wants the least amount of damage to our mech regiments. Yes, we should retreat," he sighed. "But just like the Davions, our supply lines are stretched thin. There aren't enough dropships that can come en masse to get all of us offworld in one or two waves. At best, we'll save half of our numbers before the Davions realize what's going on and overrun the rest. At worst, the Suns will win here before we can do that."
The officers looked among themselves before the same brave officer spoke up. "Then you must be the first off this world, sir."
He paused and looked up. "What?" Tormano asked angrily.
"You are Tormano Liao, the brother of the Chancellor, before you are an officer of the Capellan Confederation Armed Forces, sir!" he quickly responded. "If the Suns got their hands on you, then they can use you against the Chancellor! Our Chancellor is … he is not his father. He will do everything to save you." Then he whispered almost conspiratorially. "Maybe even at the cost of the confederation."
Tormano was lashing out before he could even stop himself. He jumped over his desk and punched the officer straight in the face. They both fell to the floor, and he grabbed him by the front of his uniform.
"Don't you dare question his love of the confederation," Tormano hissed. "Don't you dare question MY LOVE for the confederation, either! I will die before I allow myself to be used by the Suns! I will NOT allow myself to become a tool for the damned invaders to eat even more chunks out of us! Do you hear me?!"
"Y-Yes, sir," the officer stuttered with a bleeding lip from underneath him. "B-But that doesn't change the situation. You must go offworld first before Styk falls, sir. You cannot become the c-chancellor's weakness. Please…!"
Then the radio crackled.
"{Styk defenders, this is Colonel Judith Abermarle of the Red Lancers.}"
Red Lancers…?
Red Lancers?!
Tormano hurriedly got off the floor and reached for his radio. "This is Tormano Liao of the Hegemony Bay militia!"
"{Ah, our Chancellor's own brother! Hold on, we'll be there soon!}"
"No, why are you here and not by my brother's side, colonel?!" he asked desperately.
Surely… Surely, his brother wouldn't strip Sian of its defenders for Styk's sake?! Surely, not?!
"{Because this was the chancellor's orders, Major Tormano,}" she replied. "{Congratulations on your promotion, by the way.}"
"What about Sian…?"
"{... The chancellor has decreed onto me that, in this point in history, Styk is more important to the confederation than Sian. Styk must not fall. Now, tell me the situation on the ground so that the Chancellor's Own may enact vengeance.}"
-VB-
Three months.
Over the course of three months, a regiment of the AFFS and another regiment of mercenaries had been ground up and spat out by the meat grinder that was Styk.
And Ardan Sortek, the man leading the Davion Heavy Guard, could only sigh with relief when four more regiments came to save his ass.
Because Styk was hell on earth, and he was all too happy to share the burden of being the commander.
Styk should have fallen already, but the damned Chancellor had fortified and up-armed this world to the point that having two regiments at the start had done nothing to conquer this world.
Hanse had kept sending him the reinforcements he needed, but they all kept grinding away to nothing.
And now, he was getting nine more regiments to make sure Styk fell.
"M-Marshal!"
He looked up from his desk.
"What is it?" he asked the officer who'd come scrambling in.
"The Capellan reinforcements are here!"
"I see," he grunted. Maybe those nine regiments won't be enough. "Who did they send?"
"T-The Red Lancers, three regiments of the McCarron's Armored Cavalry, and a mercenary regiment called the Gray Death Legion, sir…!"
Ardan stared at the officer with tired eyes before he let his head fall into his hands.
And for the first time since he arrived on Styk, he broke his composure and groaned.
-VB-
A/N: it's not just the Davions stripping their worlds of regiments to invade. It's also the Capellans stripping their worlds of regiments to defend.
Also, this means that the entirety of the Big Mac is currently fighting the Federated Suns at two critical locations.