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Chapter 1 – The Best of Enemies[]
“The art of war is of vital importance to the State. It is a matter of life and death, a road either to safety or to ruin. Hence it is a subject of inquiry which can on no account be neglected.” -- Sun Tzu, 孫子兵法 (The Art of War)
Sian Center for Martial Disciplines, Sian, Capellan Confederation
16 November 2795
<{“Neurohelmet Pattern Confirmed, enter security passphrase.”}> The booming synthetic voice of the TDR-5Sb Thunderbolt Battlemech filled the cockpit.
A young woman dressed in the jade-green and gray uniform of a cadet took a deep breath and spoke Chinese words written over three thousand years ago during the Warring States: “Zhìgāowúshàng de zhànzhēng shǒuduàn shì zài bù dǎjià de qíngkuàng xià zhēngfú dírén.”
<{“Passphrase accepted. Shíshī awakens. REACTOR ONLINE, SENSORS ONLINE, WEAPONS ONLINE.”}>
The MFDs sprang to life.
The pilot took a deep breath and adjusted her SLDF Royal-issue neurohelmet slightly in a nervous gesture.
Her brown eyes flickered over across the readouts for her Ceres Arms Warrior PPC, the Delta Dart LRM-15 mated to a Nirasaki A4 targeting-tracking system, the trio of Diverse Optics Type 18 5cm lasers, the Hovertec Streak SRM-2 rack, and finally the twinned Starflash Plus 3cm pulse lasers for anti-infantry use.
With the readouts all showing that training mode was set and confirming that her weapons were safed, she throttled up and strode out of the Mech Bay. The metal behemoth shook the ground slightly with each step of its sixty-five ton chassis.
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Thunderbolt Heavy 'Mech
The yellow-white sphere of Sian’s rising primary cast her shadow behind her as she turned onto the road heading to the training ground for her cadet unit’s scheduled field exercise.
Then a light flashed in her cockpit and a tone sounded in her ears.
The pilot gave a sigh and flicked the switch to open the communication channel. “Cadet Liao reporting. Service to the State.” Her voice was sharp and confident, revealing nothing of her thoughts.
There was a crackle and then the Tikonov-accent of Major Kornyeva came on the secure comm channel. Her cadet battalion commander’s voice was flat. “Cadet, your presence is required elsewhere. Return to the Mechbay and await transportation.” There was a pause and then a softer, more human tone in the next words. “I’m sorry.”
Grandmother.
The pilot took a deep breath and spoke in a flat tone. “Understood, Major. Orders received, returning to Mechbay. Against fate even the Gods strive in vain.”
The flight to her destination passed in silence.
The armed guards who had picked her up did not speak, which suited her mood.
Dressed in a cadet’s simple jumpsuit thrown on over her cooling vest and shorts, Ilsa Liao wished to be alone with her thoughts.
The shuttle landed at the private pad in the heart of the Celestial Palace.
Ilsa absently caressed the familiar hilt of her dao sword -- a fifteenth birthday gift from Grandmother after she had qualified as a Mechwarrior Cadet, had achieved her brown belt in Chángquán, and had passed her Citizenship examination -- as she waited for the hatch to cycle.
“This way, Lady Liao.” The functionary waiting to guide her, a courtier from Andurien, spoke to her with the subtle signs of worry in his eyes and posture.
Not Cadet. This was… not good.
She continued through the familiar halls where she had grown to adulthood. Her mind raced like a rat in a cage behind her facade of poise and confidence as the destination became apparent and her fear increased.
The doors to the medical wing hissed open and she stepped inside. The courtier spoke as she approached a guarded door. “Your sword, Lady Liao….”
A slashed hand cut him off and dark brown eyes burned as Ilsa Liao turned on her heel. “I bear it to the woman who is the only parent I have known after my father, mother, and uncle died in the Eagle’s talons over Calloway VI! Respect for parents and elders is the essence of goodness!” She snapped out from a face that could have been carved from stone.
A weak voice came from beyond. “Bring my granddaughter to me and then leave us alone.”
On the other side of the door, a dying woman lay in a bed surrounded by the medical machinery and doctors keeping her alive. Monitors hummed and a rhythmic mechanical hissing came from the cardiopulmonary machine that was vainly trying to cleanse her blood from the myeloma that was killing her as her plasma cells unstoppably destroyed her own organs.
Ilsa hurried to her grandmother’s side and knelt.
“Lǎo ye, I am here.” She choked out as her composure cracked.
The doctors and guards moved away to give the precious illusion of privacy to her and her only surviving blood kin. Never true privacy. Not here, not for the Liao.
A weak hand caressed her tear-stained cheek.
Ilsa leaned into the touch.
“Sūnnǚ, I do not have long to live, so you must listen to my final lesson.” Her grandmother’s voice was weak, yes, but also filled with wisdom and authority.
Ilsa shook her head. “You’ll get better, I’m sure….” She whispered while fresh tears fell.
A hacking laugh answered her. “Even the Celestial Wisdom cannot order Yen-Lo-Wang around, child. No, you must engrave on your soul that the power that I hold and you shall inherit comes with honeyed traps. Just because I can order it does not make it so… and the cost of mistakes… my mistakes….”
A rattling cough interrupted her Grandmother. Then, as Ilsa leaned close, her grandmother whispered to her as their eyes met. “I can never forget what I did to Kerensky. How stupid, how insanely stupid I was! I broke a good and honorable man, better than I have ever been… and for what reasons truly? Wounded pride and the lure of the throne on Terra that Amaris left for us to squabble over like mad children. We destroyed in instants what it took our ancestors generations to build! What I did that day -what I continued to do until I came to the truth. Too late!- was worse than any crime, it was a mistake!! Now we have all paid bitterly for it. The cost of my folly continues to build for our people. My orders to strike the Mariks has only turned their hatred toward us into a raging inferno so now the Confederation burns in the fires of war.”
Ilsa looked into her grandmother’s eyes and swallowed as she spoke quietly with fear and pain in her young voice. “And now the Inner Sphere joins us amidst the typhoon of this conflict. We battle the Marik and raid the Davion, the Steiners fight on both fronts, and the Dragon unstoppably marches to the heart of the Federated Suns with blood and fire. I… have read the documents you sent to me about the true casualty estimates for the CCAF. Not one in seven of my classmates will live to see his children grow up at the current rate of losses. What can we do, Grandmother? What… can I do without you to guide me?”
Barbara Liao looked deep into her granddaughter’s eyes. “For me, my time is passing and I shall have to make my reckoning to the Judge of the Dead within the next day, two at the most. I fear it shall not be a pleasant one for me.” Ilsa swallowed and nodded in understanding. ”For you, I have made arrangements for the regency as best I can. Sandol Quinn, Prefect of Tikonov, shall be your Regent. He is a loyal man and a good soldier, but ambitious. He will keep the State safe for you to inherit. When you do,” Barbara’s hand slid from Ilsa’s face, “be strong, but be as the willow to bend with the course of events rather than break. Be brave but not reckless. Be wise with such wisdom has been granted to you and those you trust to advise you. Be compassionate when compassion can be safely given, but also be as hard as your dao’s steel when such is needed to keep the State and the People safe.”
Ilsa nodded, forcing back her flowing tears as best she could. The seventeen year old young woman clasped her grandmother’s hand as the life faded from the twentieth Chancellor of the Capellan Confederation.
Her grandmother gave her a desperate look as she gasped out her final words to the untried young woman who would have to become Celestial Wisdom after her. “Most of all, Ilsa…. Most of all, find a way to make our people safe from the madness that I have helped let loose before it consumes us all….”
Part 2[]
11th September, 2796
Kentares IV, DCMS Occupation Zone
A short Japanese man clad in the uniform of a Draconis Combine Mustered Soldiery officer strode into the command outpost as energy seemed to crackle from his presence.
The assembled generals bowed before Jinjiro Kurita.
They knelt on the soil of a minor farming planet that had been a forgotten and forgettable backwater in the Draconis March of the Federated Suns.
They bowed to the soil that had tasted the lifeblood of this man’s aged father -- the blood of the Dragon.
Minoru Kurita, Coordinator of the Draconis Combine, had been shot by an insurgent on the Ninth of August. The Armed Forces of the Federated Suns had used the confusion caused by Minoru Kurita’s death to escape with the remnants of their troops before the new Coordinator could arrive with the cream of the DCMS, the Steel Dragon itself, at his back.
Mad steel-blue eyes surveyed his gathered samurai.
The Dragon commanded...
“Kill them all!”
...The Kentares Massacre began…
...over nine of every ten inhabitants of the helpless planet of Kentares IV would perish in the next five months…
...and the Inner Sphere would never be the same again.
- Author’s Note
- This is a Battletech alternate universe fic. To those non-Grognards reading this, in canon Ilsa Liao was 12 years old when her mother died, leaving the CapCon under the regency of the ambitious and Davion-hating Sandol Quinn (the last non-Liao Chancellor) for six years.
In Canon, Ilsa therefore reached the age of majority and inherited the rulership of a larger but militarily exhausted realm trapped in a two front war with the Free Worlds League having made serious inroads. Meanwhile, the militarily revitalized post-Kentares Federated Suns were smarting for revenge after the CCAF under Quinn attacked them at their lowest point with a ‘stab in the back’ during the Kentares Massacre.
Here, she is 17 years old with a six month regency before her birthday on 19 April 2796 makes her a legal adult and full Chancellor.
Calloway VI was a canonical Capellan attempted counterattack in March 2789 to hit a major FWLM forward base to slow the League down. Unfortunately, several Capellan officers who had been sickened by Barbara Liao abandoning the Ares Conventions to use unrestricted WMD release on civilian targets in the New Delos Massacre leaked the attack plans to the League. The result was a catastrophe for the CCAF, including the loss of both of Chancellor Barbara Liao’s sons in the League ambush. In this AU, it went as canon, save that Ilsa was 11 when her parents and uncle died at Calloway VI (and her grandmother nearly died) instead of 6, so much more of an impact on her psychology.