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Gotta get to reading this in detail paulo brito, glad to see you posting!

Lothian League
Lothario System
February 23, 3054
Zenith Jump-Point

Eight JumpShips suddenly emerged, transporting the I Legio of the Mario Hegemony. Caesar Sean O%u2019Reilly believed in going for the jugular, so he had decided to start the invasion of the Lothian League by directly invading the capital world, thinking that after securing Lothario, conquering the rest of the League would be little more than mopping up.
After a year and half of constant raiding, he was confident that the enemy forces were exhausted, even if the number of mercenary units under Lothian colors had been superior to what was expected.
However, less than half an hour of the emergence, just as the DropShips had formed and started to move itowards the distant capital planet, the alarms sounded %u2013 an emergence jump-point was detected almost on top of his forces.
What emerged was a WarShip, one that immediately launched four big spheroid DropShips, easily bigger than the only Overlord of the I Legio, and a continuous number of ASFs.
On all frequencies the same message was heard %u2013 %u2018This is Space Master Adam Ostergaard of the Taurian Navy. The Lothian League is under our protection. Surrender (pause) or be destroyed.%u2019

TCS Zarantha Calderon Bridge
%u2018Don%u2019t be stupid, power down%u2026%u2019
%u2018You said something Ensign?%u2019
%u2018No Sir. Sir, they are accelerating in our direction!%u2019
%u2018So, you chose Death. So be it. All ships, open fire.%u2019
The first ship hit was the Overlord Maximus, flagship of the Marion  Hegemony Expeditionary Force. Stricken by 3 Naval Lasers 55, it lost power immediately, venting atmosphere from several places. It was quickly followed by two Unions, hit by several NAC/30 shells, while two Triumphs and another Union were hit by several Killer Whale, fired by the two Lee PW.

During this time, the 32 ASFs from the I Legio were targeted by 52 Heavy ASFs, a mix of Hell Duck, Vulcan 6N and Thunderbird D36b, all loaded with AAM.. Even before they got in range, the Marian Fighters were all killed, each hit by two or more Arrow IV missiles, while the light erASFs, Sabre 27b and Dragonfly MM-3 stayed behind guarding the Taurian Fleet.

%u2018This is not a battle, it is a massacre.%u2019
%u2018You are right, Ensign, but it was their choice, I asked then to surrender. They decided to attack.%u2019
%u2018Sir, the radio. They are asking to surrender.%u2019
%u2018Put me on.%u2019
...
%u2018Reduce the relative speed to zero and shutdown your engines. Prepare to be boarded. Any resistance will be dealt with deadly force.%u2019
%u2018Well, I see that our ground-ponders friends are going to be disappointed.%u2019
%u2018Navy Rules, Sir.%u2019
%u2018Navy Rules, indeed.%u2019

Stop reading my notes.

Note.: This chapter is chronologically before chapter 79, this is what happens during the time the Taurian task-force is moving into the Lothian League.
In August 3053, a high-level Canopian delegation arrived in Taurus for negotiations following the evolution of the situation in the Free Worlds League, the Marian Hegemony with the aim of dealing with these peculiar situation and with the territory between both nations.
The fact that the Magistracy and the Concordat had an excellent relationship since before the beginning of Emma Centrella's reign, and had complementary objectives and very few conflicts of interest, eased the negotiations considerably.

By the end of September they had agreed on the following, the systems West of a line  Liu's Memory - Fronc (including both) would fall under the sphere of influence of the Magistracy, while those East of said line would be for the  Taurian Concordat.
Regarding the Marian Hegemony, it was decided that as soon as the Marian Armed Forces invaded the Lothian League (something that both nations took for granted),  the MAF would invade the systems of Islington, Algenib, Mariu's Tears, Horatius and Ballalaba, while the remaining systems - Bacallieu, Pompey, Suetonius, Stafford, Alphard (the capital), Addhara and New Venice would be occupied by the TDF. As soon as the MAF had available forces, it would also clean Astrokaszy from the pirates present there.
The goal of the Concordat was to either add ”its” worlds to the Lothian League while at the same time turning it into a client state or to create a Concordat enclave if negotiations with Lothian League were not to its liking, while all the Magistracy wanted  was to eliminate a troublesome neighbor (and win several systems), taking advantage of the fact that the  Free Worlds League was busy with a nasty civil war and couldn’t do anything.
To allow for this decisive strike,, the Magistracy had to authorize the movement of a considerable number of Concordat forces through its territory, in order for them to arrive on time. This was taken into account in the new military alliance between both nations, which considerably expanded the treaty in force since the end of Andurien Crisis / Periphery Wars of the 3030s.
Among the forces sent by the Concordat were the 1st Battalion of the Revenants and the Reach Guards (the former Aurigan Royal Guards) as well as 3 other battalions of ‘’Mechs, all with combined arms support. Sending so many of the core Arano-Bassot forces was a move from they political enemies, hoping that they would suffer grave losses, and at same time let Coromodir with weak protection. That was swiftly counter-balanced by Kamea, contracting the St. Cyr Heavy Assault Group, that had just ended its contract with the Federated Commonwealth. An expensive move, no doubt, but in the end the defense of Coromodir was even increased.
Part of the agreements included the Concordat providing equipment and training to Magistracy technicians to develop, implement, and maintain a native HPG network.
The biggest surprise, however, was the Magistracy informing the Concordat that it had acquired two WarShips, the MCS Coranna and the MCS Kossandra. While the first was a Whirlwind class Destroyer the second was a Texas class Battleship. The problem was that although the MAF was able, at the limit, to maintain the MCS Coranna, the repair of the MCS Kossandra because of serious problems to the keel was far beyond the capabilities of Magistracy. Due to these problems, the Magistracy proposed to exchange the ship for two Concordat class Frigates and two Pinto class Corvettes as well as training personnel to maintain and crew them.
After deliberations ,the TDF Navy, always eager to get its hands on a bigger WarShip, agreed on the idea but only after a close inspection by Taurian technicians to know if they could do something out of it.
Of course, the Concordat was also very curious to know how the Magistracy managed to get its hands on such WarShips or the advanced ’Mechs they had recently deployed.

The answer was a fascinating story, that the Magistracy didn’t share right now but the truth emerged years later. Some years ago, an exploration ship in Deep Periphery South of Magistracy, had found a system with a dead colony. In orbit, there were several JumpShips and two WarShips, while on the ground, nothing indicated that there had been a conflict. Taking the maximal protection (use of advanced Hazmat suits for everyone stepping on the planet), the  exploration ship found out after investigation that all these were the remains of a ghost colony, clearly in the middle of expansion phase by the look of the infrastructure. Only after a hospital had been found, they were able to get a picture of what had happened. According to the records that were found, a native virus spread in the colony 5 years after they had landed. By the time they noticed the problem, it was already widespread and people were dying at a very high rate. The records ended with no indication of a cure or of any survivors.
As for the origin of the colonists, they seemed to be the survivors of a Second Exodus, calling themselves SLDF in Exile / Wolverines. The WarShips in orbit were the SLS Yukon (destroyer), now the MCS Coranna and the SLS Bismark (battleship), now the MCS Kossandra.
Due to the care needed to prevent the people involved in the removing of the hardware, to catch the lethal virus that had killed the colony, it took years to transfer the equipment and ships back to the Magistracy, something that at this moment, mid 3053, was in the final phase. Not only did they have about a regiment of advanced ’Mechs, including several models never seen before (among them the Bull Shark), but also a fully automated ’Mech factory, that had been transferred to the Magistracy and was currently working at full capacity.

What the Magistracy got from the dead Wolverine colony apart the hardware, was a treasure trove of information. The stories of the Exodus, the Pentagon Civil War, Operation Klondike, the creation of the Clans, the Trial of Annihilation of Clan Wolverine, and their Second Exodus to the doomed colony near the Magistracy, where the last ones had died. Also several technical datacores with information on iron wombs, advanced weapons like the Enhanced ER PPC and ER Medium Laser that until now were only produced by the Concordat and several advanced designs like the already mentioned Bull Shark, or the Pulverizer, Stag I and II, Mercury II and Wolverine II. But the most important information was the location of the Clans Homeworlds and the full maps of the Exodus Road, the original one and the reverse one taken by the Wolverines during they return to the Inner Sphere and beyond. That information was shared with the Concordat, in exchange for support in several projects, including terraforming and help in building/upgrading strategic (civil and military) industrial complexes. It was  decided between both nations that this information would not to be shared with other, at least not for the time being.
Jean-Luc also wanted access to that information and to more designs. While thanks to being part of the Concordat elite, he was granted access to much of it, he couldn’t get access to others  as the Canopian protected their advanced automated factory, that apparently was even more advanced than the late SL ones that the VMI and CHI had. Even after negotiating with Emma Centrella and in exchange for sending technicians to help creating a battle-amour factory  in Canopus and providing production rights of the Dragonfly MM-3 and 3R, Jean-Luc only got the blueprints and production rights for the Mercury II, but no data on the automated advanced factory . On the plus side, the Canopians also shared the full specs of the Nighthawk Mk.XXII (not the XXI or XXX, the ones with stealth armor, if they had access to it, these were MIM only) in exchange for helping building a factory to produce them.

Note: At this time and in this AU, the MHAF only has the I, II and III Legio – all veteran forces, the IV, V and VI have not been created so far. Their remaining forces are militia, poorly armed, equipped and trained, when compared to the Inner Sphere, Taurian Concordat or Magistracy of Canopus regular units.

May 12, 3054
New Venice
Marian Hegemony

Contrary to the cautious estimates made when deciding to launch the offensive, the Marian Hegemony forces didn’t have Pocket WarShips. They didn’t have any real forces with few Aerospace Fighters or ‘Mechs,the majority of the defenses being composed of several mechanized units with material outdated by the MAF / TDF standards. Even if it was a good training exercise in deploying units far away someone would have to answer for this totally wrong estimates.

In the New Venice system, the TDF forces landed unopposed, not a single ASF having challenged the approach.
Four days after landing, the 1st Battalion of the Revenants was advancing towards the world capital, facing only sporadic attacks from the few surviving MHAF forces present, a mix of the III Legio and local militiat, he majority  of the defenders having already been destroyed.
Outdated material or not, the III Legio units, unlike the local militia, were competent enough to have to be taken seriously during the offensive. The day before, the heiress of the Aurigan Reach had been wounded in an attack by Gladius Hover Tanks and was resting in a field hospital. Attacking by surprise from a well camouflaged position, that somehow had escaped detection from the ASFs flying high (this is what happens when you get too lenient and contemptuous of your opponent), the fast hovers had spread confusion in the scouting elements of the Aurigan unit and only the fact that two lances were present instead of one had allowed the Revenants to get the upper hand in this encounter. Hit several times in the head by rocket salvos, Sara Arana-Bassot’s Toro II had fallen with the pilot injured. The ambush had however cost the defenders dearly, since only one Gladius had escaped.


Note: due to the fact that the Marian Hegemony in this AU did not have access to AC/10 (in OTL they were imported from Taurian Concordat), the Gladius are equipped with rockets and / or SRMs.


The landing on Alphard had been lightly contested with a dozen ASFs trying to prevent it. Obviously without much success, since they had  to fight one WarShip and close to a hundred ASFs all of them carrying much more advanced technology.

With Sean O'Reilly captured on Lothario together with his eldest son only 14, the regency was in charge of Livia O'Reilly.Until now her  job had been to manage Alphard Trading Corporation, however she tried her best to defend what remained of the Hegemony with her ordering the II Legio stationed on  the capital world, while the remaining systems were defended by the III Legio and militia forces. But since the Marian Hegemony only trusted in might, she had to deal with among others the Prefect of the II Legion, which had been left in charge of the II Legio and all units on Alphard by Sean O’Reilly.
This Ron Brown was very aggressive and was only used  to fight in the nearby Periphery without understanding the changes he was facing with the advanced weapons and numerical superiority enjoyed by the TDF. This is why he decided to contest the landing of the TDF forces, without regard for Livia O’Reilly’s advice, that it would be better to disperse, given that the invaders had WarShips support and a clear command of the air following the  destruction of the airfields, which at this time had only atmospheric fighters, and of all the MHAF ASFs in space, executed by Naval Lasers, in a clear demonstration of force that didn’t reach the Prefect mind.

Although the II Legio had numerical superiority over the Taurian forces that had just landed, the difference in technology and even in mass, both in normal average and because of the use by the TDF of a Company worth of Assault ‘Mechs  was much larger than the MHAF thought.
Adding artillery, including Arrow IV, Battle Armors and ASFs with air-to-ground weapons, made the battle for Alphard a fast, brutal and incredibly one-sided one.
At the end of the day, the Marian Hegemony capital was in the hands of the TDF, with the rest of the reigning family captured as they tried to escape.

In Pompey, the local commander of the III Legio, seeing that the invaders (the Reach Guards) were mostly composed of Griffins decided to move as quickly as possible to a close combat option, guessing  that the PPCs and LRMs of the invaders would have great difficulty in reaching his lighter, but faster ’Mechs at such short distance.
Unfortunately for the defenders, the TDF Griffin's were the TC variant, with Enhanced ER PPCs with no minimum range, and two extra Medium Lasers. Instead of fighting the invaders to their advantage, the III Legio was  massacred.

In the  other systems, the invasion went better than planned - the defenders being fewer in numbers, with bad equipment equipped and virtually no air support.
Within one week, the Marian Hegemony had been totally occupied.

Following the discovery of some advanced systems among the captured equipment of the I Legio in Lothario, ongoing investigations were trying to find out from whom the MHAF had acquired them.

The conclusion of the team that had examined the MCS Coranna / SLS Bismark was that repairing the WarShip, while possible, was more of a complete rebuild than a repair / refit.
Still, the Black Navy of the Concordat was much interested in the ship, reasoning that a rebuild of this size, while expensive and time consuming, would bring immense information and experience in maintaining, and even building large WarShips.
In the end, the 'purchase' of the WarShip from the Canopians was approved, and it was transferred to Bolthole, where it would be rebuilt.
Meanwhile, the troops that had participated in the conquest of Marian Hegemony were coming home, being replaced by second-line forces, since the mission now was more a peacekeeping one, under the Lothian League flag.
Sara Arano-Bassot, had returned earlier, courtesy of a semi-Command Circuit, landed  on Coromodir in September 3054.
Thanks to the best Canopians specialists in cosmetic surgery, the scars she had gained in the campaign, were eliminated without a trace.
The Taurian population and the political opponents of the Arano-Bassot had also noted that they had been the only noble family to send private forces for this campaign. The population did approve of it while  the political opponents of the family took good note of this campaign which fueled even more their anger and their arguments against the Reach.

While Jean-Luc stayed 'at home', dealing with the expansion of industrial capabilities in Coromodir V, Sara went with her mother to Taurus, part of her training to one day replace her as regent of the Reach province.
By mere luck, or perhaps not, Edward's eldest son Anthony (call me Tony) Calderon, who by this time was doing his military service in the Concordat Navy, and who was also being trained to replace his father, was at home. Both youngsters found the other fascinating, and conversations between the two were constant.

In September 3054, the MAF executed the long awaited 'cleanup' at Astrokaszy. If on the one hand it did not employ WarShips, as for the moment it only had one, at both nadir and zenith jump points appeared  simultaneously JumpShips loaded with combat DropShips that started launching shuttles with marines and ASFs,
This time MIM had done its homework, and a JumpShip also appeared at the most common pirate point and relatively close to Astrokaszy III, immediately launching DropShips to capture the JumpShips stationed in that area.

Even before the first troops set foot on the planet, the mission was already a success, with 7 JumpShips captured, 4 Invaders, 2 Merchants and a Tramp, and 2 DropShips, both Jumbo class, showing that they too could conduct efficient space operations.
Shervanis City had close to a battalion of ’Mechs defending it, but  the defense was short-lived. The MAF had indeed learned, and had sent a combined force, supporting their advanced 'Mechs  (including 4 Bull Shark Assault ones) with artillery, armored vehicles, infantry and ASFs, All of them well-trained and equipped forces, very different from the pirates and near-pirates who opposed them.
At the end of September, having achieved its objectives, the MAF withdrew from the system. .If in space they had captured only two DropShips, in Shervanis City they had captured ten more, taking with them eight  in lift-off condition and destroying the last  two before leaving. Between the material captured and the pirate groups destroyed or fleeing, it was a major blow to the pirates in this area, the survivors left for less hostile areas.
Meanwhile, similar, albeit smaller operations had taken place in the space between the Taurian Concordat and the Magistracy of Canopus, with all systems known or suspected of harboring pirates receiving 'visits' from the MAF or the TDF. August and September 3054 was a bad time for pirates in this part of the Periphery.

When news came out in October 3054 that communications with the Greater Valkyrate and the Oberon Confederation had been lost, everyone thought that the Federated Commonwealth or the Draconis Combine had also eliminated these pirate dens, even though the Oberon Confederation was a more or less legitimate kingdom by this time.
Only Jean-Luc, when he got the news, knew what was coming.

Four months after the loss of contact with the Great Valkyrate and Oberon Confederacy, I was looking at the reports about modified Portable PPCs for use with battle-armor and preliminary research reports on miniaturized gauss rifles also for battle armor, when I was ‘asked’ to participate in a war council with the leaders of both the Taurian Concordat and Magistracy of Canopus and their close advisors.
In the old days, that would have included fast traveling to Taurus via command circuit. Now, thanks to the military HPG network created just for that, it was a matter of going to the secure office in the palace where our end of said network was.
Thanks to the infiltration of the rear / administrative echelons of the AFFC, pioneered by the Reach Intelligence and largely expanded by the TMI and MIM, we had a good idea of what was happening inside the Federated Commonwealth, military wise.
This program focused on infiltrating / compromising secretaries and / or data operators with security clearances high enough to deal with confidential / sensible data, but low enough to be virtually invisible, as they were so many of them in the administration making everything work.
Even if the relationships between both nations had been getting better in the past decades, the Federated Commonwealth was still the principal focus of the TMI.
Not that the spy game had gone completely one-sided. Several agents had been caught  inside the Federated Commonwealth and been traded quietly for MIIO / LIC ones caught inside the Concordat. For obvious reasons, both nations preferred a quiet and civilized resolution of these problems.
According to our reports, some unknown forces had started invading the Federated Commonwealth from the North, near the Free Rasalhague Republic. Because the FRR served as a buffer state between the Federated Commonwealth and the Draconis Combine, the best forces of the AFFC were not deployed in that area, nor any WarShip, at least according to the reports of our intelligence services. The invaders were using unknown equipment, but from the videos that our intelligence got their hands on, they were identified as the Jade Falcons, one of the Clans, the descendants of the SLDF, reported in the Wolverine data files.
At the same time, we got news through the Magistracy and Concordat offices in Outreach that the KungsArmé had placed several contracts for mercenaries, paying better than they normally did, and indicating high risk missions.
To me, that indicated that the FRR was also invaded and I expressed that opinion. However while the majority agreed with my statement, we didn’t have any confirmation so far. Nor any information if the Combine was also invaded as I suspected if everything went like in OTL.

Like I thought already a few moths ago, the invasion of the Inner Sphere by the Clans had started.
Because of the data found on the Wolverines planet, both Periphery nations knew that this was an invasion by the descendants of the SLDF that had departed with Kerensky. A force that both nations didn’t particularly like. Hated would be more exact. Both considered hilarious that this time the war was fought on the territories of the Inner Sphere nations and not on theirs.
Edward Calderon and Emma Centrella both decided that because the invasion was on the other side of the Inner Sphere and on Inner Sphere territory, they would for now wait and see. Evidently, defense preparations and expanding the budget were approved, but no information was shared with the Inner Sphere nations under threat. But knowing that the Clanners ultimate objective was the control all the Human Sphere and that if they conquered the Inner Sphere, they would come to the Periphery after, they already knew that some measure of collaboration with the Inner House would be needed to be necessary, but later. For now, both sides could exhaust themselves.
In the FWL, a bomb attack killed Thomas Marik and several of his supporters, creating chaos in his faction.
The Wolf’s Dragoons called all their units home, activating the escape clauses of their contracts, without explanations to anyone.
Both the TMI and the MIM detected movements of troops inside the FC, in direction of the invasion area, but considerable forces were still kept on the common border with the Draconis Combine. For now, no movement of WarShips reported, but access to that information was (still) very limited.
The aid from VMI / CHI to MMM to help them built the NightHawk factory provided both companies with insights in ways to help and improve the construction and design of the related but slightly inferior Colibri PA(L) design series.
One of the things that caused concerns in both Periphery nations was the number and types of WarShips the invading Clans had. Unlike the powers of the Inner Sphere, they had several Battleships, including several of the Texas and Mckenna classes, something that no-one had with the exception of the ex-SLS Bismark that was starting to be analyzed in Bolthole, but that would probably take a decade or so before being declared operational. Obviously if everything went right with the refit / update.