BattleTech Novella Series

LIFE ON THE EDGE... Life in the sparsely populated periphery is rustic—and dangerous. Small settlements means small defense forces. No wonder the outer worlds often fall prey to piracy. So when Mark Castor shows up on the World of Randis with relief aid in tow and an assault 'Mech to protect it, the locals are overjoyed to see him. But Castor isn’t at all what he appears to be—and before he’s done he’s going to turn the entire concept of privacy on its head. Follow the twists and turns of Castor and bombshell Tracy Malfont in “Red Khopesh” and “The Bitter Taste of Hope.”

BROTHERS IN ARMS…   At long last, the Clans' campaign for the Inner Sphere is coming to a head. Khan Alaric Wolf is preparing for his biggest moves yet…and is willing to enlist just about anyone who can help him achieve his ultimate goal—the conquest of Terra.   To that end, he sends one of his own on a special assignment. Marotta Kerensky is a Clan Wolf warrior unlike any other—the perfect candidate for a mission unlike any other: convince the legendary Wolf's Dragoons to rejoin the Clan they originally came from.   But when Marotta reaches the mercenary unit, he finds them quite different from the storied force of a century ago. Times have changed since then, and the Dragoons have as well…or have they? Driven to accomplish his mission at any cost, Marotta allies with a Dragoons officer on a risky gambit that may help him deliver what his Khan wants…or tear Wolf's Dragoons apart forever.  

A STRUGGLE TO SURVIVE…   Former hauptmann Ronan Carlyle is a man without a nation. After his former commanding officer declared herself governor-general of a reborn Tamar Pact, Ronan, a loyal Steiner officer, led a group of soldiers and techs including his sister, Isobel, back for Garrison for reassignment.   But on Garrison, his troubles multiply. The senior Lyran officer brands the 26th Arcturan loyalists traitors and cashiers them, stranding nearly 200 former LCAF soldiers, technicians, and crewmen on a Lyran world with no way off-planet.   Forced to scrounge up a way to survive, Ronan and Isobel hatch a plan to get the former LCAF members back to their homeworlds by salvaging 'Mechs. But when a Lyran scout battalion goes AWOL over an off-world mission squashed by their commanding officer, the LCAF is shocked to discover the Arcturan loyalists have built up the largest contingent of combat equipment outside the militia. Ronan's people need cash. They have skills. And there's history in his name…   Thus, the Gray Death Legion is reborn. First as a way to get funds for his people to leave. But they fight the Lyran unit—winning by use of unorthodox tactics—and discover they don't want to disband…instead, the reconstituted mercenary unit wants to find its next employer…  

FIGHT FOR HIS LIFE...   The Clans: a civilization that worships war. Soldiers altered in body and mind. Men and women bent to the blade. They slash through space, cutting through their enemies like a laser cuts through flesh. No one can stand against them. Star Commander Richard Bekker of Clan Ghost Bear is smart, tough, and ruthless—the perfect Clan warrior. Victory is all he has ever known. That's about to change. Because he's going to face an enemy unlike any he's ever seen—unlike any anyone's ever seen. And if he is going to triumph, if he's going to survive, he will have to reach inside, past his Clan training, and find the part of himself that is human.

UNCOVERING THE SECRETS OF A LOST WORLD…   Interstellar explorer and freelance treasure hunter Dr. Brooklyn Stevens has made the find of a lifetime—an entire planet thought lost for centuries. Jardine was supposedly wiped off the maps of the Inner Sphere during the hard-fought Succession Wars, but the verdant forested world she and her adventuring partner just crash-landed on tells a much different story.   And so do its inhabitants. Dr. Stevens and her partner soon find themselves between two very different groups: one whose members are an unholy amalgamation of man and machine, the other a hardy group that lives off the land. Both groups are soon after Stevens and her knowledge about Jardine—one side to protect the planet from those that would seek to reclaim it, the other intent on killing anyone who knows of its existence. Caught between both sides, Brooklyn must uncover the mysteries of Jardine…and stay alive long enough to tell the universe about it…      

VICTORY AT ANY COST… Jump into your BattleMech cockpit, fire up your fusion engine, and charge into the fray with two BattleTech novellas from Philip A. Lee and bestselling author Blaine Lee Pardoe. A Splinter of Hope: Violent expansion of the Capellan Confederation and the Draconis Combine has cost recently crowned First Prince Julian Davion both his mentor and countless Federated Suns worlds. To rally his people, he funnels the fires of justice into an ambitious yet risky campaign to retake a vital system: New Syrtis, the occupied capital of the Capellan March. However, the Capellan people have fought dearly for their prize and will do anything in their power to hold onto it. Will Julian's gamble preserve the future of the Federated Suns, or is the invasion doomed before it even begins? The Anvil: Khan Malvina Hazen of Clan Jade Falcon is known throughout the Inner Sphere as a merciless, bloodthirsty tyrant. The next target for her scorched-earth, take-no-prisoners tactics is the Lyran Commonwealth world of Coventry: a persistent stain on the Jade Falcons' history. But not all Falcons follow Malvina's lead. Ordered to take Coventry at any cost, Galaxy Commander Stephanie Chistu wishes to see her Clan victorious, but no victory is worth the Jade Falcons losing their very soul. To stand up to tyranny and find an honorable path forward for her Clan, she must balance the razor's edge between duty and honor—or die trying.

FIGHT FOR THE CROWD Solaris VII is the Game World, a planet of spectacle and intrigue entirely devoted to ferocious gladiatorial combat. Except on Solaris, the gladiators aren’t people—they’re BattleMechs, thirty-foot high, walking engines of war. David Singh is a down-on-his-luck ’Mech pilot with just enough skill and raw guts to attract all the wrong kind of attention. Singh’s dream is to become a championship fighter in the games. He’s an underdog, but his flamboyant fighting style gives him a solid chance of making the jump. But he’ll have to watch his step. Because on Solaris, the most dangerous contests take place outside the coliseum.

WIN OR FALL… For Douglas, Jade Falcon Elemental cadet, there is no choice—he must succeed in becoming a warrior or die trying. Unfortunately, he is perilously close to falling—right out of his sibko. Consistently at the bottom of his class, everyone around him—from his trainers to his fellow sibkin—believes he will not survive his Trial of Position, and should quit before he is killed. But Douglas knows he is destined to be a Jade Falcon warrior. And when he meets a man with a checkered past who promises to show him the true ways of the warrior, Douglas embarks on a dangerous path that might bring him the victory he craves…or utterly destroy him in a brutal trial where sudden death is everywhere…

The Federated Suns stand at the edge of a precipice… Violent expansion of the Capellan Confederation and the Draconis Combine has cost recently crowned First Prince Julian Davion more than just countless strategic worlds. The war's toll claimed a mentor and close friend, and righteous vengeance burns bright. To rally his people and preserve the future of the Federated Suns, Julian funnels the fires of justice into an ambitious yet risky campaign to retake a vital system: New Syrtis, the lost capital of the Capellan March. Success would dislodge an ancient enemy from their strategic foothold in Suns space, but failure may cost Julian the nation he inherited. However, the Capellan people have fought dearly for their prize and will do anything in their power to hold onto it. Will Julian's gamble save the very soul of the Federated Suns, or is the invasion of New Syrtis doomed before it even begins?  

THE STRUGGLE FOR BATTLEMECH SUPREMACY CONTINUES... Prometheus Unbound is the second of six BattleTech novellas detailing the struggle to create the next awesome weapon to rule the battlefield—the BattleMech. Fifteen years after the Terran Hegemony fielded the Mackie, the very first BattleMech, the Great House has been running rampant over the other Houses in the Inner Sphere. Any who try to fight the Terrans and their death machines are utterly defeated. but there are other ways to level the battlefield... And the Lyran Commonwealth is about to employ one of the oldest strategies in the book: if you can't beat 'em, steal from 'em. A crack commando unit is assigned their most perilous mission yet: infiltrate a heavily-defended Terran world and steal the plans for the Terran BattleMechs. Besides the odds being stacked against the, the leader of this team has his own demon to deal with—one that stands twelve meters tall, and shakes the ground when it walks...

ALL OR NOTHING... It is 3071, and holy Jihad rages in the Inner Sphere. Safe on worlds claimed two decades earlier, Clan Jade Falcon watches its enemies tear themselves apart. But a new threat is bearing down on the Falcons. Clan Ice Hellion, another of Kerensky's Clans, has traveled the winding Exodus Road to attack its warrior brethren--for while the Clans hunger to conquer the Inner Sphere, they are warriors, and they have little qualm warring amongst themselves for advantage. Khan Connor Rood of the Ice Hellions knows his Clan is taking a desperate risk. Victory over the Jade Falcons will give the Hellions a place in the Inner Sphere, new worlds to conquer and exploit. It will place them among those rarified Clans who are not trapped in the distant Clan homeworlds. It is a bold plan. It could easily fail. For the Jade Falcons have been warned of the Ice Hellions' approach, and powerful and veteran Jade Falcon BattleMechs are turning to meet them. Can Rood and his Hellions defeat the forewarned Falcons? With Jihad raging in front of them and genocidal wars of reaving consuming the Clan homeworlds behind them, can the Hellions survive?

BESEIGED ON ALL SIDES... It is 3071, and holy Jihad rages in the Inner Sphere. Safe on worlds claimed two decades earlier, Clan Jade Falcon watches its enemies tear themselves apart. But a new threat is bearing down on the Falcons. Clan Ice Hellion, another of Kerensky's Clans, has traveled the winding Exodus Road to attack its warrior brethren--for while the Clans hunger to conquer the Inner Sphere, they are warriors--and they have little qualm warring amongst themselves for advantage. Khan Connor Rood of the Ice Hellions knows his Clan is taking a desperate risk. Victory over the Jade Falcons will give the Hellions a place in the Inner Sphere, new worlds to conquer and exploit. It will place them among those rarified Clans who are not trapped in the distant Clan homeworlds. It is a bold plan. It has failed. The battle-proven Jade Falcon Clusters have shattered the Ice Hellion assault. The worlds the Hellions captured are being lost to the Falcon reconquest, and Hellion MechWarriors are dying in battle. Khan Connor Rood knows he must find a way to save what is left of his Clan. He knows he has to bring the Falcons to one final, decisive battle and earn a chance at escape. But the legacy of Khan Raina Montose's bad decisions linger...and the the circling Jade Falcon forces have been joined by the hungry herds of the Hell's Horses Clan. Is Rood's desperate plan to rescue the remaining Hellions doomed to fail?

A UNIVERSE AT WAR... It is the year 3027, and the Inner Sphere is at war. Centuries of near-constant warfare have left the feudal realms exhausted and near collapse, but none will surrender. National armies clash on hundreds of worlds, and hired proxies—mercenaries—fight on countless more. Mighty MechWarriors lead their BattleMechs like the ancient knights of old, but they are not the only soldiers on these brutal battlefields. Fusion-powered tanks, heavily armored and nearly as powerful as 'Mechs, roam the battlefields, and few are as deadly as the ones in Halsten's Brigade, in the service of House Steiner's Lyran Commonwealth. Even fewer are as deadly as tank gunner Private Frederick "Sniper" Jones, the man even MechWarriors fear. Put him in a Schrek PPC Carrier, point him at the enemy, and he'll take them down. Leaving him with nothing but dreams of how things could have gone wrong, until the next enemy comes along... Sniper collects two previously-published short stories: "Sniper" and "Panzer."

A PATH TO REVENGE... When the armies of the Draconis Combine killed his parents, Galen Cox swore vengeance. Now an elite MechWarrior with the Armed Forces of the Federated Commonwealth, Galen will have a chance to exact his justice when the Combine raids the planet Ryde with a BattleMech battalion. As two armies clash on this snow-and-ash covered world, two men will be forced to examine exactly why they're fighting even as they both strive for victory and absolution.

THE UNTOLD STORY OF THE INVENTION OF THE BATTLEMECH... Break-Away is the first of six BattleTech novellas detailing the struggle to create the next awesome weapon to rule the battlefield—the BattleMech. In the mid-25th century, factions of mankind are desperate to invent the next technological leap in warfare—a machine that would give each group an overwhelming advantage on the battlefield. And no one is more aware of the race to perfect this new machine than the leaders on Terra. But during the final trials to find the first pilot for the Terran prototype, the contest is infiltrated by a deadly enemy who wants to ensure that no one survives. It's up to the last remaining Terran candidate—and a scientist struggling to make a breakthrough on the human-machine interface that will control this new war machine—to save Terra's BattleMech program from those who wish to destroy it.

THERE'S MORE THAN ONE WAY TO ACQUIRE A BATTLEMECH... Nothing Ventured is the third of six BattleTech novellas detailing the struggle to create the next awesome weapon to rule the battlefield—the BattleMech. In the year 2456, the Federated Suns is between the rock of the Terran Hegemony and its fielded BattleMechs, and the hard place of the Lyran Commonwealth, which has just acquired the plans to build its own walking war machines. Beset by enemies on all sides, what is Prince Simon Davion to do? Why, employ his most cunning weapon—a diplomatic envoy sent to Tharkad with the express purpose of gaining access to the stolen Battlemech plans. But when diplomatic niceties are unable to accomplish this goal, subterfuge and deception will have to win the day...

THEIR MISSION: ACQUIRE BATTLEMECH PLANS, NO MATTER THE COST... The Spider Dances is the sixth of six BattleTech novellas detailing the struggle to create the next awesome weapon to rule the battlefield—the BattleMech. There are three ways to accomplish a difficult objective: Be first. Be smarter. Or cheat. The Intelligence Directorate of the Capellan Confederation, otherwise known as the Maskirovka, is well-versed in all three. But when the first two methods do not achieve the desired results, they have no problem resorting to the last one. And when the covert team gains the plans they are willing to die for, that resolve will be tested to the limit as they try to escape the Free Worlds League planet they have infiltrated, matching wits with one of the most feared intelligence officers the FWL has to offer...  

A PACK DIVIDED… Clan Wolf has gone to claim Terra to fulfill the promise made by Aleksandr Kerensky centuries ago. But for those left behind, their story is a very different one… Star Captain Jacinda of Clan Wolf Is one such warrior. Stuck on Campbelton in the Wolf Empire due to injury, she commands a sibko training facility while stewing over her lost chance to go with the Wolf touman to attain glory in the campaign for Terra. But heroism comes in many forms, and when a new invader targets Campbelton, Jacinda is able to unleash her primal warrior nature, and defend the Wolf's pups against all comers…

SOMETIMES THE BEST PRIZES AREN'T FOUND ON THE BATTLEFIELD... A Dish Served Cold is the fifth of six BattleTech novellas detailing the struggle to create the next awesome weapon to rule the battlefield—the BattleMech. In the 25th century, the Free Worlds League is fighting for its life against the encroaching Lyran Commonwealth and its new weapon, the BattleMech. With a new, untested leader on the FWL throne, a precarious plan is hatched to gain the Great House the edge it needs to fight off the invaders. Using guile and seduction, a small team of infiltrators plans to take the information the Free Worlds League desperately needs, and the men who possess it, into their arms in one fell swoop...but how can they create a scenario where these technicians will come over of their own free will?  

BURIED IN THE ASHES OF WAR… Freelance explorer and treasure hunter Dr. Brooklyn Stevens has made her career finding lost artifacts from Inner Sphere history, but during the waning days of the FedCom Civil War, a job offered by the academic organization known as Interstellar Expeditions affords her the chance to pursue the find of a lifetime: a missing planet, one lost in the ravages of the brutal Succession Wars. But the world of Jardine did not only die in fire—it was erased from stellar maps entirely, and Brooke's employer wants to know why. She must hunt down the only known link to this forgotten world: a dangerous predator native to Jardine, whose initial discoverer was silenced under mysterious circumstances. Someone wants this planet to remain buried—and they will go to any lengths to ensure that Brooke's quest to uncover the truth of Jardine's disappearance ends in tragedy.

THE QUEST FOR BATTLEMECHS TAKES ITS TOLL ON ALL WHO SEEK THEM... Fall Down Seven Times, Get Up Eight is the fourth of six BattleTech novellas detailing the struggle to create the next awesome weapon to rule the battlefield—the BattleMech. The BattleMech. King of the battlefield. Prized. Feared. Coveted. Fearing being left behind in the arms race among the other Great Houses, the Draconis Combine will do anything—anything—to possess this fearsome technology. Even grind its most loyal subject into useless husks in a decades-long attempt to gain the information the Dragon so desperately needs. Two brothers. One an intelligence analyst and deep-cover operative, the other a leader in the Combine's commando unit. Both with the same goal—recover the BattleMech plans—but with very different ideas on how to accomplish it. But only one will survive and emerge triumphant... or will the Dragon's machinations destroy them both?  

CONTRACTS MAKE STRANGE ALLIES… For new mercenary groups just starting out, one of the primary rules is "Follow the money." Even when it's being paid by the same people who forced you to become a mercenary unit in the first place. Ronan and Isobel Carlyle are experiencing this right now, having accepted a contract from the newly-formed Tamar Pact, the cluster of planets that recently seceded from the Lyran Commonwealth—and got the once loyal-Carlyle siblings cashiered as turncoats. Now the Pact wants the Legion's help with one of their newer planets, Crimond. But murky mission parameters and an unhelpful liaison officer leaves Ronan and Bel wondering who's a friend and who's a foe. And when the Legion splits up to handle two different missions, Bel finds herself an entire continent away, on a mission to scout an abandoned Star League base. But she soon discovers the base—and the nearby community—is anything but abandoned…and if she doesn't act fast, she and her GDL commandos will receive a welcome they won't walk away from…  

A NEW BEGINNING… Hank Mallory runs the Wolfhounds, an elite, self-sufficient company of the fabled Kell Hounds mercenary unit. But when Callandre Kell gives the order for the Hounds to scatter in the wake of vicious attacks from the Jade Falcons, Mallory and his unit must transform overnight into a brand-new unit or risk being hunted down themselves. Naturally, they head to the Mercenary's Star, Galatea, to eradicate their previous identity and do whatever it takes to transform into something new…no matter what unusual missions that transformation may require… (NOTE: This is the same novella that was distributed to the BattleTech Mercenaries Kickstarter campaign. If you received this story through the campaign, you do not need to buy it here.)

IMBALANCE OF POWER…   On the faraway Clan Homeworlds during the Golden Century, Nicholas Kerensky's vision of the Clans has blossomed into a thriving, varied culture where the warrior is esteemed above all…and MechWarriors, in their armored war machines, are at the pinnacle of Clan hierarchy.   The eighteen Clans have existed in relative technological parity as well…until the day Clan Coyote fields a radical new 'Mech that gives them the edge on any battlefield—the OmniMech. Supremely customizable thanks to its modular design, the OmniMech threatens to upend the delicate balance of power among the Clans…and its secrets become a hotly contested prize.   In the annual Trial of Possession for the OmniMech technology, the Jade Falcons have won the right to challenge the Coyotes first. But along with the upcoming 'Mech battle, a shadowy force is willing to do whatever is necessary to ensure that the Falcons succeed…even if it requires the sacrifice of cherished ideals…  

VENGEANCE SHALL BE THEIRS… Three years after the massacre of their families on Bromhead, the hard-bitten mercenary unit Hansen's Roughriders have already exacted revenge against Taurian Concordant forces on the planet Lindsay. But that is only the beginning. When the Second Taurian Lancers—the unit responsible for the massacre—lands on Midale to conduct a supply raid, they run into Colonel Wolfgang Hansen and the entire Roughriders force—all out for blood. And underestimating the Roughriders may be the last mistake the Lancers make. Amid the savage fighting, a Federated Suns liaison officer uncovers evidence of a third party's involvement in the slaughter—and who may have been behind it. But will he be able to gather the necessary evidence—and eyewitnesses—before the rampaging Roughriders destroy everything in their path? (NOTE: This is the same novella that was distributed to the BattleTech Mercenaries Kickstarter campaign. If you received this story through the campaign, you do not need to buy it here.)