EMCOTS 21

=Emergence (Concertverse) - Chapter 21=
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==Wolves at the Gates==
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===Combat on Gallery===
Nondi Steiner Memorial Nature Preserve
Gallery
Donegal Province
Lyran Commonwealth
17th December, 3142
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Illuminated by the flickering off-white of parachute flares, the Wolf Clan BattleMechs advancing across the mist-shrouded valley floor looked like ghosts, their dark grey camouflage paint jobs seeming to blur and distort their outlines. More emerged from the mists, at least a full Supernova Binary on the advance, just from what was visible; moving with strutting arrogance, as though they already owned this world.
“Strikers, scrap ‘em!” Colonel Roderick Steiner shouted, bringing his Rifleman’s reactor to full power, shedding fibre-optic comm lines and the links to the auxiliary power truck and advancing at a walk. Dropping his crosshairs over the nearest Clan ‘Mech — a Shadow Hawk IIC — power readings still read too low for the lasers; instead, he gave it full bursts from both autocannon, streamers of tracers and lethal metal clawing wounds in the Clan machine’s armor, staggering it.
Around him, a full company of BattleMechs in the blue and silver camouflage of the First Steiner Strikers rose from their positions hidden among the trees, sleeting autocannon fire into the Wolves or waiting a moment for targeting systems to stablized before shrieking ripples of long-range missiles sailed off their launch racks. A volcanic eruption of energy fire on the left told Roderick that Hauptmann Tran had ignored orders and unleashed her Nova Cat’s full arsenal, sucking even the aux power vehicle’s immense snap-discharge capacitor banks dry as brilliant whiplash-arcs of charged particles and gem-bright laser beams flayed a Blood Reaper, knocking it flat on its back in a mist of shrapnel and semi-molten composites as Tran’s machine slumped in heat-induced shutdown. Armored vehicles — from a pack of hoverbikes and Shandras dashing out onto the valley floor to scout, to an immense Gürteltier assault tank rolling into firing position next to him — and infantry, in light rig and battlesuits of half a dozen marks, none of them from the Strikers, unmasked at the same time, adding more fire to the cauldron.
Roderick frowned at the insignia on the Gürteltier; the hammer and wolf’s-head of the Stormhammers’ Tharkan Strikers regiment. God knew the Commonwealth needed every soldier they could get, but his father and — for as little time as he’d known Adam Steiner — grandfather had taught Roderick that, in the end, a man’s worth was only in his word, and in how well he kept it. Jasek Kelswa-Steiner hadn’t, deserting the Republic he’d sworn to serve, and even if he’d put those oaths aside for House Steiner, Roderick had never been able to make himself trust the man.
Shocked as they might have been by suddenly coming under fire from a reinforced battalion, the Wolves reacted like the superbly trained soldiers they were. Elementals dropped from the ‘Mechs they clung to like armored koalas, bounding forward to meet his own battlesuit screen, as the 'Mechs turned from line of march and attacked into the ambush. The Shadow Hawk spread a double-volley of tactical missiles across Roderick's position, supported by a second Blood Reaper; explosions uprooted trees, buried a squad of Hauberk infantry in their foxholes, and slammed home against Roderick's Clan-built Rifleman IIC. One burst against the low-slung cockpit, sending a crack halfway down and halfway through one panel in the ferroglass shield and slamming Roderick sideways in the seatbelts, bruised and battered, the other hits raising welts of orange and yellow across the damage readouts.
Tasting blood, Roderick tied everything into his primary triggers and targeted the Shadow Hawk again. Bright strings of cyan daggers bored the wounds he'd already made deeper, opening ragged, molten holes that the autocannons' explosive rounds exploited. A heat sink burst in a gush of grey-green coolant, hissing into toxic steam where it hit hot metal; and a brief flare of white on thermal indicated a crack in the Shadow Hawk's engine shielding. A volley of missiles — tactical missiles from the pair of Linebacker Echo OmniMech muscling in to support him, and LRMs from the three surviving Hauberk Battle Armor troopers, who’d dug themselves out and were mad as hell — and the thunderclap blow of the Gürteltier's Gauss Rifle crushing in the Blood Reaper's missile rack drove the Clan machines back, buying Roderick time to think, to plan, to hope that the Stormhammers and what was left of the Fourth and Tenth Lyran Guards were holding on either flank, and indulge in a moment's internal cursing of Maurer or Vedet or whoever was responsible for this fiasco.
It had all seemed so sensible when he'd been briefed on the plan; a counterattack out of Gallery, to knock the Crusader Wolves back on their heels, buy time for the rumored reinforcements — from the Federated Suns and an extremely vague "other allies" — to arrive, and corral the damaged units falling back on Tharkad — put them in some kind of order before they joined the capital's defences. It might even have worked, if not for running headfirst into a full-scale Wolf attack; one that’d caught them while everything was in the open and loading the DropShips, with no time to set up for a tunnel defence. And now, here they were, one more desperate stand to cover an offensive turned into a headlong retreat just ahead of disaster.
At least we've had plenty of practice there, Roderick thought bitterly, checking his rear cameras, catching the rising star of another DropShip boosting from the Lyran LZ to the JumpShips and safety. The Wolves' aerospace forces at least were playing things cagey, content to harass but never risking a serious engagement; scuttlebutt said that the Navy fliers had crippled one of their supporting WarShips, which if it was true — and it was too good news for Roderick to believe sight unseen — would certainly explain that uncharacteristic reluctance to commit.
And this battle, at least, was going the way it’d been planned. Roderick strafed a flurry of laser bolts across an advancing Elemental squad — dropping one and forcing the others to go to ground — as he matched sight to the tactical feed. The Wolves were outnumbered, outweighed and outgunned; the only machine they had equal to his strongest, a Tundra Wolf, was being pounded into scrap metal by a Götterdämmerung and a Davion-built Marauder, the latter armed with weapons equal to the Clans’ finest. And they were bunching up to his right; swing in the left flank and they’d be crushed, buying more room and time. Hell, if he could get some artillery called in, they might be able to destroy the Wolf unit outright.
“Tran, swing in on their left,” Roderick ordered, carefully keeping his voice calm and level. “Catch them in a crossfire. And” he added as an afterthought, “someone find out where our scouts are -”
A sudden burst of laser fire flickered further down the valley, catching Roderick's eye, and he swung his machine around just in time to catch a Shandra — briefly seeming to stand on three wheels — as it slalomed out of the treeline, trailing smoke and with the gunner, unconscious or dead, hanging limp in their safety harness.
"- am repeating. Striker Six Actual, this is Scout Five Actual, can you hear me?' The Shandra driver's voice; a young woman's, taut with desperation and clinging to precise comms protocol as a shield against the panic he could hear edging into her voice. Probably not even out of her teens; the Gallery militia's scout vehicle crews recruited heavily from the valley-runner racing community — young, adventurous, and good at driving fast over dangerously uncertain terrain without crashing.
"Striker Six Actual confirms, Scout Five Actual," Roderick responded. "I hear you; welcome to the net. Report status."
"Status is that we're ******, Striker Six" the scout snapped back, angrily, apparently forgetting she was swearing at a superior; and Roderick — tactfully ignoring the shouted obscenity — would take anger over incipient panic. "There's a ****** Assault Trinary — at least — headed right for our left flank. Heavy jamming support; couldn't see them until we practically drove into them."
"Hauptmann Tran, belay last," Roderick snapped out orders rapidly, flipping to the unit address channel, "refuse the flank; fold it back towards the LZ. All elements get ready for retrograde fire and movement. We've stung them, people," he added with a bravado he didn't feel, "now we want to duck their counter."
BattleMech contacts flashed up on his sensors — on exactly the bearing the Shandra had come from; five, with a swarming confusion of smaller contacts that had to be Elementals, and more, still indistinct, behind. An Executioner, a Clan-built Highlander and Warhammer, and a Night Wolf. And at the heart of the Wolf formation was a signature that turned his blood to ice; Daishi. Great Death. There were faster machines, and deadlier machines — even larger machines, if some rumors he’d heard from down towards Terra were true —  but something about the blunt slab-sided purpose of the Daishi — visible now, its bulky weapon armatures shoving aside trees it couldn't simply walk through — beyond its enormous protection and firepower, terrified anyone who had to face one and heartened anyone it stood alongside.
“Concentrate fire on the Daishi!” Roderick ordered, dropping his crosshairs over the bulky silhouette and giving it full bursts from his whole arsenal. Bright laser-daggers and a storm of lethal metal reached for the Daishi — and missed as it halted suddenly, ducking under the barrage with disturbing grace; one pulse burst slashed a glancing line of molten armour across the thickly plated torso, but everything else went high, spending itself among the trees. Its return fire — a pair of headache-bright particle bolts and a salvo of LRMs — struck back, the missiles impacting Roderick’s Rifleman IIC with the surety of Streak guidance, chipping away armor and raising more orange and yellow across the damage board. For a moment, he thought the PPC bolts had missed, before the voice of the Gürteltier's commander cut in.
“Striker Six, this is Armor Nine,” they reported, voice thready with heat-strain, “we gotta pull out. That Daishi just spot-welded my turret to the deck, and my gunner’s down with heat-stroke. Sorry.”
“Get clear, Armour Nine,” Roderick responded, sending more laser pulses the Daishi’s way, keeping the Wolf's attention on him — hopefully — while the Gürteltier ground backwards, its heaviest armour facing the enemy until it was hull-down. Roderick was moving back himself; his Rifleman was no faster than the Daishi, and if his warbook was reading right, there were four-packs of medium-gauge pulsers riding alongside the PPCs. That kind of firepower would rip apart anything he had up close.
More contacts flared up to his rear, shaking Roderick for a moment before their icons came up the dark blue of friendlies. A company of BattleMechs and fast-moving armor, with another spreading out in a fire support formation; at same time, twin snaking arcs of particle beam fire lashed at the Daishi, sending molten armour sloughing away from arm and hip.
"Striker Six Actual, this is Storm Six Actual," a familiar voice, thick with the clipped, patrician accent of Republic nobility, came over the radio; and Roderick fought down the urge to sigh or curse at the sight of the equally familiar gold-ringed icon tagged with "Templar TLR2-O (JKS)". Of all the people to be rescued by, it had to be him. Still, for his people's lives, Roderick could bear that embarrassment. "Get your people moving out of here, Striker, ASAP."
Roderick frowned. That certainly wasn't normal for Kelswa-Steiner, who tended to aggression's excess more than anything else. "Striker Six does not copy that, Storm Six," he replied. "Bring your Shields in and we can take these guys, Storm."
"Negative, Striker. Disengage and fall back, immediate." Static fuzzed on the link for a moment, before — as Jasek's Templar shouldered its way into line with Roderick's machine, slapping out more PPC fire — a private laser-link connected them. Jasek looked a wreck, Roderick saw; his olive features drawn and pale with a wild, haunted look in his eyes. "Just shut up and listen, Steiner," Jasek snapped in a heat-induced rasp. "You don't like me — in fact, I seem to piss you off by existing. Fine; that doesn't matter. What does matter is that the Fourth are going — only thing holding them together are my Tharkan Strikers and a Star of Wolves-in-Exile with more guts than sense — and when they do, our flank's going to be as open as a Marik's purse. I had to throw most of the Shield in to hold our line of retreat open; only kept the two companies I've got here. Men and women are dying while we thrash this out, Colonel," he finished in a fractionally softer tone.
And that was an argument Roderick knew that he couldn't — didn't want to — counter. "Striker Six acknowledges, Storm," he answered, before flipping back to unit push, "all units, initiate retrograde movement. The Stormhammers are our anchor." For a scratch unit, his troops reacted well, peeling back the slower vehicles and 'Mechs first as APCs dashed forward to collect their infantry cargos.
Roderick locked up the Daishi again. Before he left he was going to make damn sure that at least one Wolf wouldn't be chasing them. Which reminded him, and Roderick wanted to kick himself for forgetting something that vital as he activated his satcomm uplink. "Longbomb, this is Striker Six Actual, I have trade for you."
"Longbomb acknowledges, Striker Six," the LZ fire direction center responded. "We are reading you loud and clear. Call the ball."
"Requesting full-pattern sustained interdiction barrage, at CR 371 through to CR 374, Roderick ordered, locking his autocannon on full rate as he held down the triggers, splintering away more of the Daishi's armour. That was eating through ammo at a ruinous pace, the round counts in freefall, risked melting the barrels or fusing the firing mechanism as well; but it was a fair trade for time, and for each backward step. "High-ex, cluster and FASCAM in that order — hell, I'll take cruise missiles if you've got any left."
"Request logged, working," there was a catch in the FDC officer's voice, and then, "Striker Six, our feeds show friendlies all over that fire zone. Confirm CR 371 through CR 374 is the target."
"That is confirmed, Longbomb," Roderick snapped, easing off on the autocannon as he switched targets, strafing laserfire after the Night Wolf as it bounded up the opposite slope; Jasek and Tran combining their fire to keep the Daishi back. The rest of the Wolf assault machines were close enough to start reading types.now, and none of it was good; another Daishi, a captured Fafnir and Stalker II — the latter already spreading volleys of range-enhanced LRMs among the Lyran positions — and a squat, low-slung Turkina that he could ID. "Time first impact to plus-ten this message, Longbomb," Roderick's voice softened, recognising what he was asking the FD officer to do, "anyone who's not out by then isn't going to be coming."
"Acknowledged," the FDO replied quietly, "fire mission is in the net and prepping. Good luck, and Godspeed, Striker Six."
"Time to move like we've got a purpose, people," Roderick called over the unit push, levelling more fire at the Night Wolf as he did. "The gunners are going to be dropping a whole Province of hurt on this valley in ten mikes. We are not going to be here when it lands; the Wolves will. Let's make those mangy curs bleed for the privilege."
And who knows, he thought, centering himself in the rhythmic backwards steps of his 'Mech, and the shriek-crack of its weapons, we may even survive.
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===Dispute among Wolves===
"Well," Seth Ward drew the word out in a way that had Alaric's teeth clenched to avoid uttering a comment that much more forgiving Khans than Seth Ward would take as a challenge to a Trial of Grievance. "This," Ward commented with what he probably thought was commendable understatement, taking in the scorched and blasted moonscape that was all that remained of a lush, heavily forested valley — and the Ninth Wolf Guards Cluster — with a gesture, "we did not want, did we, Galaxy Commander?" His voice turned close to a snarl as he repeated: "Did we?"
"Neg, my Khan," Alaric replied, careful not to let any emotions show. He entertained fantasies, for a brief moment, of drawing one of the throwing daggers hidden in his sleeves and ending Seth's Khanship right then and there. But, a fantasy that had to remain; Seth was nearly twenty feet away, every definitely fatal target he could be sure of striking at that distance armoured by the tough, thickly layered fibres of Seth's cooling suit, and a Point of Elementals from the Golden Keshik stood close enough to cut Alaric down heartbeats after he began any such move. "I admit, my Khan," he continued in carefully respectful tones that he strongly suspected didn't fool Seth for a second, "error in judging Roderick Steiner. But the error is not mine alone."
"Aff, Galaxy Commander, that is so," Seth allowed, with what he probably thought of as magnanimity. "The Watch, too, has misjudged this Steiner officer gravely. To impute cowardice to his refusal — until recently — to claim the name he was entitled to by mere birth was, clearly, mistaken. And now, we assumed him soft, and Star Colonel Cardin and his Cluster have paid for it. But still, this plan, and much of its execution, were yours, and the failure was there as well."
Alaric wasn’t sure about Roderick Steiner. A Wolf warrior might renounce a Bloodheritage that he was entitled to, under certain very specific circumstances, but he’d never heard of a Spheroid doing the same unless forced to. And ordering a mass bombardment of an area there were still allied units operating in — that was a level of ruthlessness that Alaric had to respect. But then, he did not have a choice, did he? By reported unit markers, Alaric knew there had been at least seven fresh Lyran commands massing here on Gallery, and they’d effectively destroyed four of those; in such circumstances, even the frailest Spheroid would show spine.
“What is my Khan’s will?” Alaric finally asked; he knew, of course, but the formalities had to be observed.
“Your surkai will be to remain here while we push on to Thuban,” Seth Ward responded. “Secure our position, deal with those who have fled into the tunnels, supervise the salvage of the Rogue.” Alaric winced at that; the crippled, possibly beyond saving, Congress-class frigate was a reminder that even after nearly a century. Clan aerospace forces simply weren’t as good, warrior for warrior, as Spheroid ones. At least Star Admiral Owen Rhyde had the decency to die with his ship, “and make your command ready for our assault on Tharkad.”
“Aff, my Khan.” Well, better than Alaric had hoped for, at least; with Beta Galaxy here and Zeta — whose commander was an utter nonentity that owed him everything — en route, that gave him significant strength and influence to work with.  If the Lyran troops wanted to hide in the tunnels, he would not give them the close-quarters fighting they desired; they could simply stay there, or if too annoying, he would demolish the tunnels on their heads if need be.  
Still, it is little better than fighting bandits.  He wants the glory of the next victory for himself, and will never let me go to Tharkad if he can help it.  I will be left to play nursemaid to the logistics corps and merchants!
That thought was rightfully infuriating.  Yet… he might still remind Seth Ward that there was more than one way to win glory.  The supply stockpiles here might just give him an opportunity, if he could quietly leak rumors of them; an opportunity to tempt Anastasia Kerensky from her hidden lair, and then it will be time to skin a Steel Wolf. Glory, then; glory, and credit Alaric had no need to share with another.
And when we take Tharkad, Khan Ward, there will be a reckoning between you and I.
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===Frustration===
“It wasn’t their fault!”
Hiram Brewer’s dark features were twisted in pain, where they could be seen under a swaddling mask of bandages, and despite the IV bag of painkillers hooked into his remaining arm. His voice, despite that, was clear and coherent, desperate to get his message across. “It wasn’t their fault.” Quieter; maybe the painkillers finally taking hold and doing something about the savage injuries covered by bandages.
“He speaks the truth,” Star Commander Lyria, of the Wolves-in-Exile — small, slight, wrapped in bandages in half a dozen places where shrapnel had punched through her cooling suit — spoke from nearby, biting back a curse as a medtech extracted a shard of ferroglass from her cheek. “The Fourth Guards did all any warrior could, but there were too many of the Crusaders.” And there was iron truth in those words, since Lyria had been with them and the Tharkan Strikers the whole way back to the LZ, and her Star the ones to hold off Crusader forces long enough to safely extract Brewer from his downed Zeus; her Mad Cat III — waiting outside, ready to be loaded onto a DropShip — was proof of that. The fifty-five-ton war avatar looked like some giant, uncaring toddler had picked it up and chewed its whole right side into a tangle of wrecked equipment and shattered plating.
“Out, the both of you, and let me do my work,” the medtech snapped at Roderick and Jasek. A broad, stocky — to a degree that suggested Elemental ancestry — and grey-haired woman, she wore Wolf-in-Exile insignia, and a flat, implacable expression that made it clear she had the intention and ability to physically throw them both out herself if they didn’t leave willingly. “These two must be made ready for flight, and I cannot be disturbed.”
Jasek did exactly as told immediately, turning on his heel and walking straight outside without a word; Roderick offered a nod of acknowledgement and understanding before heading out into Gallery’s perpetual storm-wracked twilight. All around were the sounds and sights of a hurried evacuation effort; the thudding tread of BattleMechs, shouted orders and the grinding clatter of tank and support vehicle treads. There was thunder, as well; natural, from the storm system away to the west, and artificial, accompanied by leaf-shaped blades of flame splitting the dark as the guns, mostly superheavy Paladin units, hurled high explosive death at the encroaching Clanners — Roderick couldn’t hide a wince at knowing they’d need to leave most of the Paladin guns; they just took too long to load and secure but he purely hated leaving that much artillery, even spiked, behind — or the prolonged brightness of a DropShip’s fusion burn as it reached for orbit.
Jasek was waiting for him a few dozen meters.away, in the shadow of their kneeling BattleMechs. "I hope Hiram makes it," the Stormhammer commander said matter-of-factly, but Roderick could feel the undercurrent of worry in Jasek's words. "He's a good man — a good soldier, and a better friend. And he's worth at least ten of his uncle."
"I think he's going to be fine; that medtech looked pretty confident at least," Roderick replied, joining Jasek in the lee of his Templar. "Just how bad are things? Overall, I mean."
"Not as bad as they could've been, but still pretty damn bad." Jasek paused for a moment, marshaling his thoughts before continuing. "The Arcturan Guards got hammered flat; we've got less than a demi-battalion back from the Twentieth and Twenty-fifth combined. Donegal Guards did better; there’s the equivalent of about four mixed regiments from the Sixth and Eighth loading up now. But,” a sigh, born of exhaustion and the weight of responsibility, “most can’t make it in time, and they’ve confirmed that Marshal von Duckler and Hauptman-general Keane, along with most of their staff, are KIA. Leaves me as GOC, and I’ve ordered the survivors who can’t make it offworld to go to ground in the tunnels.”
“I wondered why we weren’t doing that,” Roderick commented, downing a slug of Vita-Orange from his canteen. “Down there, we could chew an army — even a Clan one — to shreds in tunnel fighting.”
“Wouldn’t work.” Jasek shook his head. “The Wolves don’t want Gallery for itself, not yet at least. They want Gallery as a stepping stone to Tharkad; they’d just bomb the tunnels sealed if we gave them too much trouble, and going down there in the first place would take our forces off the board for defending Tharkad. Which brings me to orders for you. You’re going to be in charge on Thuban for a while, Roderick; I’d have offered you a berth on the Himmelstor,” he nodded towards the giant Excalibur-class DropShip, “but I’m not going to be joining you on Thuban. Not for a while anyway. Rally and try to get organised what we’re lifting out, but no discretion on this; the Wolves show up in force, you abandon the system and fall back on Tharkad.”
“Where are you going to be?”
“Chasing a lead.” A fleeting smile crossed Jasek’s features. “I think I know where Anastasia Kerensky is; and if I can get the Wolf Hunters to join up with us, we might still have the makings of a counterattack.” Another, equally brief smile. “Hell, if it comes off right, might calm down Duke Vedet — or whoever’s running things these days — enough to get us some more troops released.”
“I’m surprised you’re not throwing your own claim out for the throne.” The words were out there before Roderick could stop himself saying them, but Jasek didn’t seem offended. Instead, he just laughed briefly.
“Because, believe it or not, my ambitions are the same as yours, in nature.” Jasek smiled, properly this time. “We’ve both got limits on what we want; I want to see Skye free, and reunited with the Commonwealth — I’d like to serve as her Duke, but I can live without that as long as she’s free. You just want to be the best soldier in defence of the Commonwealth you can. Vedet,” the smile vanished, followed by a rueful shake of his head, “he wants everything. If I tried putting in for the throne — not that I would, you’ve got a better claim than I do — he’d offer to work with me, and then I’d be mysteriously dead within a year. Or I’d have to kill him to stop that from happening.”
“You really expect me to believe you wouldn’t take the throne if it was offered?” Roderick scoffed.
“I didn’t say that,” Jasek laughed again. “I mean, who doesn’t dream of being Archon? But, well, if the Estates General were ever desperate enough to offer me the throne, I’m not sure there’d be much of a Commonwealth left.” He smiled at Roderick’s almost reflexive disapproving scowl. “That was a joke, Colonel. You are permitted to laugh, even on duty.”
"Right now I'm not seeing much to laugh about," Roderick replied.  "Even if we get these troops to Thuban, everything we've lost, and the troops we're leaving behind, it was our reserve for the whole front.  We're going to lose Gallery, every world on the border, and probably Thuban as well.  At this rate, I'm not even sure we can keep the damn Wolves from taking Tharkad, even if we get Vedet and the LCAF to pull their heads out of their asses."
"Maybe not, but we need to buy time right now.  There are Federated Suns troops — the First Davion Guards — on their way, and the Falcons lost their Khan on Timkovichi.  Your cousin's reportedly already on her way to negotiate with the people who took out Malvina, she may even be there now. Hell," another smile, “considering what’s been happening and for all we know, the Republic’s dropped the Fortress and are piling right up the Wolves’ arse as we speak.”
"I got the message from her and the Kells.  Still don't know if I can believe it, but I guess I have to."  He turned his eyes back to the thundering Paladin guns, meeting another Wolf attack on the perimeter.  "They might be the only thing that can turn this war around for the Commonwealth, now."
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EMCOTS 21