New Dawn in the Sun's (Battletech AU)

[GSpectre]

This is an idea that takes heavy inspiration from Cannonshops Kowloon series over on CBT, it's not in any way related, but I did want to acknowledge that influence from the start. This is a Fed Suns centered AU, starting at the end of the Third Succession war and covering at least the beginning of the coming tech renaissance. That said, there are some AU elements which need to be acknowledged from the start, Battletech is an old IP, and because of its age there have been issues. One of the ones I'm addressing directly is primitive tech, as in this AU it emerged much earlier. The other is a complete lack of native weapons development at the start of the tech recovery. In this AU people started to design new weapons almost as soon as the recovery began, rather than that only occurring after Star League tech had been recovered. That said, I've written enough for this to be worth posting, even if I'm hardly the most consistent writer around, so hopefully; Enjoy.


March 7th 3014

Brockton Bay space dock

Brockton System, Federated Suns

Duke Andrew Brockton wasn't sure about his guest, his family had been dealing with them since Takiro's fraud but they had never sent such a high-level representative before. This was an unsettling turn of events. Not even the data transfers which had given both the Concordat and the Magistracy the ability to build their favored Swordsman had an heir travel to Brockton. For all its industrial potential the Brockton system was mostly forgotten, and even when it wasn't no one wanted to remember them.

That was the consequence of the first war. Having the Federated Suns premier ecology, biology, and genetic engineering college hadn't done them any favors. Especially when the duke at the time had deployed a large number of bio warfare containment units to the front in an effort to keep the plagues which all of the houses had unleashed contained. No one today remembered that, they just remembered that when the Storm Crows arrived on world, there were good odds that world died. Which had resulted in no one being too broken up when the Alliance college of Terraforming was nuked off the map in the lead up to the second go around.

These days Brockton was known as a bucolic farming world, of little note, with a dark and twisted history. Sure, spacers knew about the Bay and its repair bays, but never having been a production site had turned out to be for the best. Brockton had the good fortune of only being nuked once, and despite their losses Andrew was proud of how his people had recovered. No one in his family had let it be known that they had rebuilt the college as best they could, thinking it better to let sleeping dogs lie. They especially hadn't let on that the colleges library hadn't been destroyed. They had simply scaled back the Storm Crows, deploying them in smaller numbers throughout the second war as if they were switching to an apprentice system. Andrew wasn't sure what he thought about that, after all the Storm Crows had been responsible for most of the cures and vaccines produced on the golden five to this day, but he hadn't been in his ancestors' shoes. Letting a few worlds dies in order to keep his own people safe wasn't a choice he was comfortable making, and so he was glad that it had been made by the time he had been born.

"Duke Brockton," Thomas's cybernetic eye gleamed in the low light, giving him a sinister appearance despite the boyish good looks his curly hair and soft face gave him.

"Heir Calderon," Andrew replied easily, giving the man a bow. "I hope that you had an easy journey?"

"Easy as it could be…" Thomas almost growled out. "I do not want to be here but I am loyal to my nation."

"Understandable," Andrew shifted, slightly uneasy with the blatant hostility in Thomas's tone. "Welcome to the Brockton system."

"Thank you," Thomas un bent a little as he said that. "I was surprised to find out just how extensive your industry is, especially this ship yard. I would have thought it would have been stripped a long time ago to feed the insatiable appetite for carnage that your first princes seem to possess."

"How much do you know about the history of the Brockton system your grace?" Andrew asked, letting the insult pass easily. It wasn't as if it wasn't true after all. The Davion family had always been militarily inclined, and Ian's reign had hardly been out of the norm.

"Very little," Thomas allowed himself to be led deeper into the complex they were on, his cybernetic eye recording everything as he walked. Despite his distaste for the Davion's and their minions he was well aware that the Dukes of Brockton had been useful to the Concordat. Besides this was the first look that TMI would be getting of an active shipyard built into an asteroid. That was something they could use in the Taurus system. Kerensky had crippled the Concordats ability to produce jump ships when he had pulled out, and rebuilding hadn't been possible since then. Perhaps with a little luck something that his eye recorded would allow them to reclaim their place as a naval power. Admittedly Brockton was listed as a repair facility, with an attached civilian dockyard, but TMI had suspicions that there was more to it than that. The outback had too many Liberty II class jump ships running around, someone had to be building new ones even if officially they were all rebuilds of derelict hulls. "Assume that I am completely ignorant and you wouldn't be too far wrong. We have the Star league official atlas… but I don't need to tell you just how useful that is."

"Brockton was one of the Terran alliances furthest official colonies in this direction," Andrew said easily even as he guided the younger man down the corridor. "Before the outer reach's rebellion, it was also one of the centers for the Terran navy and explorer corps. If the rebellion hadn't happened, we would have been the center for the next wave of colonization in this direction. After it? Their bases were abandoned and we found ourselves very much on our own. We signed on with the Suns at their founding and kept up what we could… which was mostly the college."

"Ah…" Thomas thought about what he had been told and then cocked his head to the side. "Genetic engineering? Planetary ecology?"

"Quiet, our ecologists and genetic engineers were critical in colonizing this region of space. Not that it helped us." Andrew gave a self-deprecating shrug. "By the time Ian Cameron had his brain storm we were already lagging behind the Terrans in terms of colonization science, and the Davion's had more pressing interests then pushing the pace out here. We had hoped that we could improve our lot through the league… it didn't happen though. Alliance was downrated by the department of education to a third-tier institution and the promised funds for upgrading never seemed to appear, for some reason our people were eased out to make way for Terrans."

"Is that how you ended up in the bio weapons business?" Thomas noted the stiffening shoulders of his host.

"That is a base slander spread by ignorant fools," Andrew hissed before restraining his temper. "When the league collapsed, we were the Suns main source of trained geneticists, and so our people deployed to counter bio weapons releases…"

"I would have thought that the golden five would have had that knowledge?"

"Oh, they did, but despite being a founding member of the Suns we were outback hicks, expendable in other words, while the more important people on the five were recruited into the weapons programs…"

"Your people were deployed to the front lines." Thomas had to admit it wasn't a story he was terribly surprised by. "How did a founding member of the suns become one of the largest suppliers of the secret army in this region then?"

"Corean and Amaris." Andrew said with a snort. "After Takiro's fraud… we went looking to defend ourselves because everyone forgot about us during that little dust up. We got funding from Amaris, I'm sure you know just as well as I do why, and used that funding to put up a Corean annex on world."

"I'm surprised that wasn't looted by Kerensky, or blown up by the blackhearts."

"Why would it have been? We made locusts." Andrew shrugged as he opened the door to a well-appointed conference room. "Swordsmen, Whitworths, and Icarus IIs? We didn't have the tooling to do that."

"And yet you did and do." Thomas reminded the duke that he was just as versed in that particular history as his host. "Along with Talos and Riflemen. Not to mention the Lions."

"The Lion's weren't that difficult, dropships aren't that different from Drop shuttles, and when the Alliance pulled out, they left a lot of space-based infrastructure behind. Drink?" Andrew offered.

"Tequila if you have it."

"Trinity gold from the free world's league," Andrew poured. "During the waning days of the league we put a lot of effort into our civilian yards. They aren't the biggest, never have been, but by keeping up the production of Jumbos and Drost class vessels it kept trade flowing despite disinterest from New Avalon."

"Space based… interesting turn of phrase. You couldn't have rebuilt the mech yards without a solid industrial base and an active R and D establishment. Not after Corean came in and ripped everything out to rebuild on New Avalon."

"It took us forty years to get back to close to where we were after that happened. Twenty-eight forty-seven wasn't a good year here."

"But you did it… and sold at least some machine tooling to a couple of other nobles as well." Thomas said, his eye glinting as he became much more focused. He was tempted to take a drink, but restrained himself for the moment. "There's a reason why the outback has less pirate problems then one would think given the disinterest on New Avalon in the region."

"Because we have militia mechs? Free worlds league was the first to introduce those, bringing back the Sarissa after their tiff with Comstar was just about the only reason they didn't lose more worlds."

"They did that by converting industrial mech lines, you didn't." Thomas stated flatly. "You built all new equipment, and while it might be crap compared to the stuff that comes out of Krupp or any of the larger manufacturers… it exists. That doesn't even get into the fact that I know you are building front line equipment again. There have been too many shipments of Swordsmen over the border for you not to be, between us and the Magistracy? Two battalions' worth in the last fifty years alone, those mechs are too new for you to have been pulling them out of reserves as well."

"Limited production of front-line equipment, you'll note we don't sell Talos or Riflemen anymore." Andrew's voice was guarded.

"You still rebuilt on your own, so I have a commission for you." Thomas said flatly, enjoying the gleam he could see in the duke's eye.

"What do you want?"

"Machine tooling to build…" Thomas paused and dug a chip out of his pocket, passing it over to the noble. "This. It's the newest wonderwaffen out of Coventry."

Thomas took a sip of his tequila as the duke slid the chip into his portable reader and looked over the information. Surprisingly the free worlder's seemed to have managed to put together a fine tequila and Thomas made a mental note to see if he could get some for his own liquor cabinet. It wasn't often he came across such quality which wasn't Taurian. Given his preferences having some inner sphere quality booze on hand would be a good way to throw off anyone who thought him a complete backwater hick.

"Interesting…" Andrew spoke up, looking up from the information that TMI had gathered. "We played around with this very idea about a century ago… but never put it into production."

"Why?"

"Because people who work on weapons development have a bad habit of ending up dead, along with the entire city they were living in." Andrew said flatly. "Our security services are good but we have never been good enough to stand up to the MASK or ISF, on a good day we might be able to take SAFE."

"And yet you've been trading with us for centuries…"

"If that connection isn't well known in the fox's den, I will eat this table." Andrew said flatly while rapping his knuckles against the veneered steel. "As long as we don't rock the boat and make waves everything is all well and good, but should that change?"

"Selling us the technical specs for the Swordsman wasn't rocking the boat?"

"How many Swordsmen do you see in the Suns?" Andrew shot back. "It's a better machine then the Icarus or the Whitworth but getting a loyal soldier of the Suns into one is more trouble than its worth. They're still considered a Rostov machine, and a sign of disloyalty. If we had sold you those designs it would have meant trouble… but not that one."

"Idiots."

"Agreed." Andrew blew out a breath and frowned as he thought.

"Can you, do it?" Thomas asked, his voice displaying his eagerness despite his self-control. The Multiple missile launchers would be a game changer for the periphery powers, and if the Taurians could get them into production before the Magistracy got their Andurien derived MRMs into production… it would be worth the trouble of dealing with Davion lackeys in his eyes. Especially if he could rub it into that smug cunt Kyalla's face that TMI had for once beaten the much-vaunted MIM to the punch.

"Yes." Andrew closed his eyes and took a deep breath through his nose. "Before you decide to go with us, you should know about the downsides to what we'll be selling you. We can't make star league era tooling, what we have are monkey models at best. They take more manpower to run, and produce a product that is a half-step up from civilian or militia grade."

"But you do produce at least some front-line equipment…" Thomas said shrewdly, eyeing his host. He wasn't sure why Brockton was being so dismissive of his planets industry, unless he intended to screw the Concordat and didn't want to be blamed.

"Because we do all of the electronics work with the remaining tooling in the yards. I would love to be able to sell you a chip forge that could produce military grade chips, but I don't have the capability. Even if I did, I wouldn't be allowed to sell you something like that without permission from New Avalon. What I can make will give you military performance, but the chips you get out of it will not have the durability to be truly military grade. You're going to be looking at five to ten years of acceptable performance before they need to be replaced. On the bright side its considered to be a civilian system, so neither of us needs to worry about export controls. You could go through an official border checkpoint and not have to worry about anything more than the usual corruption issues we have."

"So, it's a Talos of electronics," Thomas found himself nodding in understanding. "Good enough to get the job done for now, but its going to need to be replaced as soon as we have access to something better."

"Exactly."

 

[GSpectre]

SWD-2T Swordsman Mek
Mass: 40 tons
Chassis: Jerrico Type II
Power Plant: LTV 160
Cruising Speed: 43.2 kph
Maximum Speed: 64.8 kph
Armor: Durallex Light
Armament:
2 Medium Laser
1 AC/5
1 SRM 2
1 LRM 5
Manufacturer: Trevlu Mechworks
Primary Factory: Brockton
Communication System: Achernar Electronics HICK-3
Targeting & Tracking System: Federated Gatherer
Introduction Year: 2780
Tech Rating/Availability: D/X-X-X-D
Cost: 2,804,993 C-bills
Type: SWD-2T Swordsman
Technology Base: Inner Sphere (Introductory)
Tonnage: 40
Battle Value: 818

Equipment		Mass
Internal Structure		4
Engine	160 Fusion	6
Walking MP:	4
Running MP:	6
Jumping MP:	4
Heat Sink:	10
Gyro:		2
Cockpit:		3
Armor Factor:	112	7

	Internal Structure	Armor Value
Head	3	9
Center Torso	12	15
Center Torso (rear)		4
R/L Torso	10	13
R/L Torso (rear)		4
R/L Arm	6	9
R/L Leg	10	16

Weapons and Ammo	Location	Critical	Tonnage
LRM 5 Ammo (24)	RT	1	1
SRM 2	RT	1	1
LRM 5	RT	1	2
SRM 2 Ammo (50)	RT	1	1
2 Heat Sinks	RT	2	2
2 Jump Jets	RT	2	1
Medium Laser	LA	1	1
AC/5 Ammo (20)	LT	1	1
2 Heat Sinks	LT	2	2
2 Jump Jets	LT	2	1
AC/5	LT	4	8
Medium Laser	RA	1	1

 

[GSpectre]

Here we have the second chapter and an outside look. One point of cannon divergence that I do need to point out is the destruction of Challenge Systems, which in cannon makes no sense. Panpour is located across the entire Fed Suns from the Draconic Combine, and when the raid occurred the Combine was conquering the Suns at a rate that made them seem unstoppable. It makes much more sense for the destruction to have been carried out by the Capellans, who were both closer and had good reason to deny the victorious looking DCMS the economic resources of the Suns. I know that the powers that be like to make the Suns the DCMS's punching bag at every opportunity but come on, the cannon raid makes no logical sense. Therefore in this AU the CCN got a chance to shine against the FSN.

I have to admit I like that Jumbo conversion, but I've been staying away from the naval side at the moment and focusing more heavily on the mechs...

November 18th 3014

Foxes Den, New Avalon

Federated Suns



Hanse Davion was, as usual, working at his desk trying to keep the paperwork which seemed to breed there under control when a knock interrupted his Sisyphean task.

"Come in," Hanse was grateful for the interruption. Reviewing the ministry of agriculture's latest food production numbers was absolutely critical, no one after all wanted to responsible for a famine on one of their worlds, but boring beyond belief. The man who entered Hanse office was small and unassuming, brown hair just starting to grey around the edges, and an eminently forgettable face. The very picture of a fussy bureaucrat except for the fact he entered Hanse's domain alone, without aids to accompany him, a suitably subtle show of power.

"My Prince," Nicholas Truston gave a brief bow upon entering.

"Nicholas, what do you have for me? More of Michaels people?"

"No, though you can expect my report by the end of the year on what we are doing to redress the issues in my ministry." Nicholas stated blandly. "An issue has come up."

"Very well," Hanse waved Nicholas into one of the two seats which faced his desk. "What do you have for me?"

"Recently the heir of the Taurian Concordat disappeared for at least half a year, as Thomas Calderon is hardly our most fervent admirer, we were somewhat alarmed by this." Nicholas's voice was measured and precise. "Given the recent shake ups in the Capellan march we had thought that we had just lost track of him, or that the analysists who were tasked with watching the Concordat had been diverted to other tasks. The Taurian section isn't the most respectable, and they are also based out of the Capellan march, but critical failures such as this are not in any way acceptable."

"I trust that the errors are in the process of being rectified?" Hanse asked, his voice low and dangerous. It seemed that Michael was playing games again, only this time with foreign actors. "And where did the wayward heir turn up?"

"I have a team of Rabid Foxes on their way to New Syrtis as we speak," Hanse perked up as he heard that. Dispatching a team from BII or CID would make sense, but MI6? That indicated something much more serious than the reports indicated at first blush. Nicholas wasn't one to panic, and him reaching for the rabid foxes for an internal issue indicated that something was deeply wrong. "As for where Thomas was found… He recently resurfaced in the Brockton system of all places."

"Brockton… Brockton…" Hanse pursed his lips as he considered where the system was. He tensed as it hit his memory, it was deep in the Crucis march almost on the border with the Periphery. More importantly the system had a reputation. "I presume that you have a team headed for Brockton as well?"

"We have teams there at the moment, BII, CID, and MI7 a team from Covert Ops as well, probably some stealthy foxes but DMI wouldn't tell me if there were unless there was a pressing need."

"The heir to the Taurian Concordat, who is known for his dislike of us, shows up on a world which is infamous for its involvement in Bioweapons, and you don't feel a pressing need to push DMI?"

"The plague dogs, or storm crows as they were known on Brockton, were a medical and containment unit despite their reputation. Brockton wasn't ever one of our hubs for weapons research, even when they had the alliance college and its full database available." Nicholas derailed the first prince neatly. For all Hanses known intelligence one man couldn't keep every fact about the realm in his memory, although he did try. It was Nicholas's job to give him the information that he needed to make a correct decision, and to correct him when he was misinformed. "Given the unfortunate loss of said facility during the second war…"

"So, Thomas isn't looking to reopen pandoras box on us," Hanse frowned. "I will admit that I cannot think of another reason for him to show up there. The Far lookers use star league derived terraforming tech, much more advanced than anything you could find in even an intact Alliance database. The Taurian's also don't use militia mechs, they don't have the budget for them even if I think they would be useful. What do we know?"

"Brockton is one of the outback's more successful civilian manufacturing centers, they specialize in agricultural industrial mechs, low levels of obsolete civilian dropship production, and have one of our few jump ship rated refit yards. In terms of military production, they are best known for their copies of the Patron industrial mech, but they also produce several militia grade mechs, they also have the last known production site for the Lion class dropship, and are known regionally to be one of the higher quality factory level refit facilities, in which they put together a handful of mechs a year that are front line quality. All of this industrial activity is overshadowed by their agricultural contributions, especially their continued efforts to produce seeds tailored for various worlds. At last estimate sixty percent of their planetary GDP is provided by the agricultural sector." Nicholas listed off the pertinent information on the system easily, having just reviewed it before coming here. "More pertinently, intentions at least thinks, they retain the ability to manufacture heavy equipment to at least Terran Alliance standards possibly higher."

"So, Thomas wants some equipment?" Hanse had to raise an eyebrow at that. "That sounds like something we can deal with through CID?"

"It should be, and would be, if their military manufacturing sector hadn't been gutted by direct order of Michael Davion in his efforts to assist Corean in rebuilding under his Peace of Money movement… Since then, the Brockton family has been reluctant to cooperate with New Avalon on anything industrial. In fact, they have actively downplayed their manufacturing capabilities, to the point where they are not a listed supplier of the AFFS." Hanse restrained his wince at the mention of that project. He thought that it had been a good idea, an attempt to pacify one border and possibly build a coalition which could have ended the succession wars through diplomacy. Unfortunately, it had not worked, or been a popular idea, especially at home, and the resentment that it had generated was alive and well in the nobility to this day.

"Additionally," Nicholas continued ignorant of his Princes thoughts on the situation. "The Brockton family has been building influence along the periphery border for a long time, quietly for the most part, but since the end of the Mechwarriors Cabal and your fathers ascensionto the throne they have been a bit less circumspect. Duke Andrew Brockton was instrumental in brokering the deal between Jalastar Aerospace and the Basantapur subsidiary of Trevlu Mechworks that set up Ajeet Aerospace to produce the Centurion light fighter and allowed Jalastar to buy out Challenge Systems. Something we have benefited from as Jalastar managed to get at least one of the Jumpship lines the Capelans wrecked in 2796 working, although they can only manufacture Liberty II class ships…"

"Didn't Ajeet manage to start production of another design last year? A heavy fighter if I remember correctly?"

"You do, one model in production with another in testing. The Vulcan, a former Rim Worlds fighter."

"I'm surprised they were that daring, Rim Worlds equipment still has a reputation even after all this time. That and I'm curious just how they found the plans for something like that."

"As an interesting side note the Brockton family owns a forty percent stake in Ajeet Aerospace, despite not having put a single pound into the deal."

"Ah…" Hanse paused to consider the long-ago treason against the star league which the Brockton family must have been involved in up to their necks. "I think I need more information about the family."

"They own about two thirds of Trevlu Mechworks, despite the facility on Brockton being the smallest and least productive of that companies' production sites. Unlike the Basantapur, Tsamma, or Filtvelt Brockton only produces medium mechs. The flipside to this is that the Brockton division of Trevlu does produce all up battlemechs, although at a low rate of production made possible by importing components, as opposed to the other locations which only produce militia grade machines."

"I am familiar with Trevlu's products…" Hanse had taken the time to actually test out a Trevlu Battleaxe and had found it to be a very able machine for its limits. Not the hardest hitting thing out there, but well able to serve as an anvil to more capable machines especially against pirates and the like. Despite its outdated equipment it was comparable to a Marik made Warhammer, if not quite as capable. "I thought that Trevlu had their corporate headquarters on Basantapur? Didn't they start out as a joint venture between the Islamabad defense zone command and Basantapur Fine Metals? One of that companies few successful ventures if my economics professors didn't completely fail me."

"Good memory, my prince," Nicholas acknowledged Hanses point before continuing to explain. "That partnership was the genesis of the idea, but without machine tooling it was one of the many failed attempts to create a militia mech producer around the end of the second succession war. It was thought to be yet another boondoggle and a subsidy capture attempt by Basantapur Fine Metals. MIIO had opened an investigation into local corruption within the Islamabad defense zone's command elements. The Brockton's came to their rescue before any indictments were handed down. They had excess capacity in their industrial mech lines, and were willing to part with it. They contributed machine tooling and plans for the original Icarus, Whitworth, and Swordsman as their buy in to the venture. As Trevlu expanded they have continued to supply the industrial equipment needed in exchange for a percentage of each site's ownership. Between their share of the licenses that Trevlu holds, something they were very careful to keep legally theirs, and their other contributions the family as a whole has come into a lot of stock. Especially given that the Filtvelt nobility had little more to contribute then the land the factories were built on."

"What percentage of each factory do they own? And why is this the first time I'm hearing about the Brockton family if they have that much control over one of our militia mech manufacturer."

"Thirty percent of the Basantapur facility, Basantapur Fine Metals has actively worked to reduce the families influence there, and they lobbied hard to keep the corporate headquarters on world backed up by Islamabad command with substantial subsidies from the Garg family. Sixty percent of Tsamma, which used to be lower until there was an attack on that facility and the Sandoval's pulled out under pressure from Corean. Brockton is theirs, no questions asked, and they have around an eighty percent stake in the Filtvelt facility." Nicholas had to check his notes to remind himself of the percentages, and even then, he could only give approximations. Some of the stocks were in holding companies, which MIIO hadn't completely untangled the ownership of. "As for why this is the first your hearing of this? The Brockton family has been low key in their ownership. Unless you go deep into the financial side of things you would think that all facilities were locally owned, in partnership with Trevlu Basantapur. On the surface Trevlu looks like it's a Garg family business, one they used their position as planetary Dukes to push into, especially after they successfully replaced the CEO fifteen years ago. With the exception of the Brockton subsidiary the Brockton family doesn't exert its influence, preferring to leave the business side of things to the professional's."

"Garg's? That's a name I haven't heard since my last history lecture." Hanse mused aloud. That family had provided the Maharaja who had brought the United Hindu Collective into the Federated Suns. The family had ended up being elevated to the nobility, but mostly been quiet since then. Still, it was a very well-respected name in that part of space, and they had long cultivated a reputation as canny thinkers. Which very well could explain why the Brockton's were willing to let them take the lead. Then again most noble families wouldn't be willing to let others have the acclaim. "I think I'm going to need more about the Brockton family then you've given me Nicholas. They're a little too different then what I'm used to."

"Very well, getting back to the family. They maintain that one of their ambassadors signed the Crucis Pact despite very little supporting evidence for their claim and the distance between the founding members of the Pact and the Brockton system. The family has always put its scions into service with the AFFS, even when it was the Federal Peacekeeping Force, although they rarely rise beyond company command. Louis Brockton served Elias Pitcairn as a company commander throughout the Reunification war, before retiring to Brockton to spend the rest of his life memorializing the crimes of the Star League and attempting to assassinate Amos Furlough. Despite not having any heirs Louis's experience led the entire family to forgo taking service with the SLDF. During the first and second succession wars the family created and led our premier bio and chemical weapons containment unit, although their enthusiasm flagged after the money for peace initiative gutted their family holdings to rebuild Corean's New Avalon factory. The family has kept out of politics, preferring to grow their influence through economic means, something they have been very successful at especially in the outback region. They have connections to Robinson through their development efforts on Tsamma, but their influence is limited there. Almost no connections in the Capellan March though they are known to have connections to both the Outworlds Alliance and the Taurian Concordat. There are persistent rumors that they can get Magistracy derived hardware on demand as well, but those are unconfirmed."

"Which makes it a political problem…" Hanse drummed his fingers on his desk. "What did they make? Before their industrial base was gutted, I mean."

"Officially? Locusts right up until the middle of the first succession war then Icarus II's, Whitworths, Swordsmen, -2D Riflemen, and Talos all of which had a remarkable similarity to the models the secret army deployed against the SLDF during the New Vandenburg uprising."

Hanse had to think for a moment before he recognized all of the models listed. Most of them used the same LTV-160 engine as the Locust, and were still relatively common. The Swordsman wasn't popular, despite having found a foothold in the periphery after the fall of the Star League, but the Icarus II and the Whitworth were popular with the lower order nobility of the Suns. Especially in the outback, where their low price point compared to their utility made them an affordable substitute for the more substantial, and expensive, Dervishe, Centurion, and Enforcer Battlemechs. Corean's rebuilding on New Avalon had been highly dependent on their Icarus II and Whitworth production. While their Valkyrie factory had kept the company afloat, the rebuilding of the Centurion lines had been financed through the sale of Whitworths and Icarus II's. Given those machines prominent place in the history of the Suns Hanse knew them intimately, the Talos and Rifleman -2D took him a moment to place though.

Both were fifty-ton designs, the Talos having been a Taurian age of war design which had seemingly been revived for the New Vandenburg uprising. By reputation it was comparable to the Enforcer and Centurion in combat power, though less well regarded. Still, it was a solid generalist trooper, if a bit more ammo dependent then anyone really liked. If he was remembering correctly, it also had a primitive electric distribution system which couldn't meet the demands of energy weapons, and its computers were legendarily barely fit for purpose which explained why it had gone out of production again. Though supposedly the TDF kept a company of the mechs in Samantha for ceremonial duties. The Rifleman on the other hand, it was a slightly beefier Blackjack, five tons heavier and fitted with heavier autocannons to back up a quartet of medium lasers. Again respectable, but not really a front-line machine. More importantly they both used the same Nissan 200 engine as the Centurion.

"So that's where Corean got their tooling after the loss of Ramen II…" Hanse could see why the decision had been made, after all the Centurion was one of the mainstays of the AFFS battlemech core. He did wonder if Corean had been just a little bit liberal in their reclamation efforts, as before the second succession war they hadn't had a license to build the Whitworth. That thought made him grimace, it did present him with a problem. The Brockton's would be highly resistant to any interreference in their industry by the First Prince, and despite the cloud under which they lived having them scream to everyone in reach that the First Prince was robbing them again would represent a major political problem, especially their Robinson connections. He already had one march lord who was two thirds of the way off the reservation, he didn't need to alienate the Sandoval's as well as his brother-in-law. "Thorny problem… Suggestions?"

"Harry Brockton is currently serving with the Heavy Guards, but he's coming up to the end of his enlistment term and has indicated that he intends to return home. Perhaps…" Nicholas pursed his lips as he thought about the political issues and tried to think of who would be appropriate to use both in terms of stature and Hanse's trust. "Ran Felsner to escort him?"

Hanse considered that for a moment and then reached for his phone and pushed a few buttons.

"Jeremy? Get ahold of Ran and Ardan, ask them if they can stop by for dinner tonight. No nothing urgent but I do have a few ideas I need to kick around and I would like their input if they are available, or can make the time. Thank you." Hanse put down the receiver and nodded, clearly having made a decision. "Between the two of them I'll bet they can uncover what is going on without any issues."


* Edited to correct errors pointed out on SB.

 

[GSpectre]

March 2nd​ 3015
Pitcairn Legion Proving Grounds
Brockton, Federated Suns

"The idea isn't that complicated, I'll bet you had your own engineers telling you exactly how they could achieve what you wanted. I know that when I was at Point Barrow someone came up with the same damn system cobbled together from parts for their senior engineering project." Theresa Wallis ignoring the wind whipping the few strands of white hair which had escaped her braid as she spoke to the heir of the Taurian Concordat. She could have included his military aid in the conversation but she had found him to be an ignorant little shit, certain that his prejudices were reality, so excluding him came naturally to her.

"They did." Thomas agreed readily. Unlike most of the inner sphere natives he had met he found that native Brocktonite's were well informed about the level of education which was actually available in the periphery, and as such lacked the characteristic arrogance he had come to expect from natives of the sphere. "When we showed our engineering staff the data, we got from the commando we had ten plans on my desk by the end of the day. Which still doesn't answer my question as to why this MML hasn't become standard issue long before now."

"Because while the engineering needed to knock one together as a one off isn't complicated… the engineering needed to put together a production line is." Andrew found himself joining the conversation between the chief of engineering for Brockton War Works, a wholly owned subsidiary of Trevlu Mechworks, and Thomas. "You need to get every step right, consistently, and you need to design and build completely new machine tools to do it if you don't want to end up doing half the damn work by hand. You can't just program what you want into a standard auto welder and walk away for the tubes, they need to be single piece cast. Then you need a chip forge, a programmable chip forge at that, so the damn thing doesn't try and jam the SRMs into the LRM slots and vice versa."

"Your people could do the casting themselves. Hell, they could get all of the mechanical bits done without any outside assistance." Theresa took up the conversation again. "That's a solved problem, and I don't doubt that your engineers can do it. It's the chips which are your road block. Unless things have changed you don't have a single manufacturer capable of putting together a military grade chip forge, or even one half way there like ours are. That was one of the key technologies which the star league made damn sure you didn't get your hands on… then when they went away everyone else was too busy either buying up the production, or smashing it flat for you to get one. Then, without that key industry, you lost the institutional knowledge of how to program those chips. Not your fault, but it's a crippling defect you might want to think about for the future."

"To be fair… there are very few planets which retain the ability to program a new chip forge, let alone build one. We wouldn't have it if we didn't have a lower tech base then usual when we started." Andrew shrugged as he admitted that. "The ones we produce are much less efficient than what you would get out of a Star League era forge, and they require three times the trained manpower to use. Of course, the tradeoff is that training said manpower is much easier, as the Alliance wasn't nearly as dependent on black boxing to keep their scientific and industrial edge."

"Don't get me started on the spaghetti coding needed for Terran systems," Theresa shuddered as she said that. "That's on top of the DMR Terrans put into everything. Good luck getting Krupp to sell you what you need to build your own chip forge. They'll sell a chip forge, make no mistake about it, but it'll be limited and non-programable, not to mention two or three billion c bills over cost and two or three decades late on delivery. No way in hell they sell what you would need to build it yourself. You might be able to get one of the Lyran corps to sell you what you need but… I wouldn't count on it. They guard their remaining tooling sites closer than the Archons heir, and getting on the list as an acceptable customer? You'd have better luck getting into Mt Asgard dressed as a Drac officer and singing about how much you love the coordinator."

"At least they have tooling manufacturers left," Andrew grumped. "We in the suns started the wars dependent on Terran tooling."

"It explains why they were the first to bring the MML to market though… Probably started the project over a decade or two ago and only now are starting up the manufacturing. It makes sense for them; they've never had a light fire support design. Refitting the Commando like they did… I wouldn't mind shaking that designer's hand. Gives them a massive leg up on the leaguers, and puts them back into contention with the Drac lights." Theresa admitted freely. "If you can get the license, I would recommend you do so. Losing one missile to be able to throw down at both short and long range? That new Commando is a sphere beater."

"That I knew. Am I out here to see your own attempt?" Thomas asked, mildly impressed by the analysis of the new commando model that Theresa had shared off hand. It matched what Taurian high command thought, and she hadn't needed a working group and three months to get there.

"Nope. We're here to see two new models," Theresa said easily. "Revised Swordsman, we stuck a five tube MML in place of the SRMs and LRMs and upped the armor. That's something I imagine that TTI will want the license for, or at least your high command will want upgrade kits for. You already dropped the small laser and downgraded the SRM pack in your two tee model for more armor… this will let you get back up to a vanilla two's firepower without losing any of the extra armor."

Thomas found himself nodding in agreement with the old engineer. The Swordsman had become something of a mainstay of the lower-level Taurian units and militias. It was cheap to acquire and operate, and good enough to hold its own against most pirates. While it lacked the firepower of the Davion's preferred Icarus II with its Imperator B, it made up for it in battlefield longevity, versatility, and durability.

"You could do the same with a Shadow Hawk… it would be a bigger improvement then the two dee." Thomas mused aloud. "Lord knows that two ache doesn't have the firepower it needs. It's a work horse and everyone has them, but there's a reason why everyone tries not to have it as the main line medium and even then, they refit them to match their own preferred specs." The two kay was currently the most popular refit for the Shadow Hawk within the TDF. Personally, Thomas thought that was a mistake, after all the most common cavalry medium in the Concordat was the Griffin and the two kay was almost a direct mod cop of that design. Still better than the dee the Davion's liked to run around in though, at least it was survivable if it came into contact with the enemy.

"We thought about that." Theresa acknowledged. "Wasn't enough though."

Before Theresa could say anything else a freshly painted Swordsman in militia colors jumped into the proving grounds and began to go through the scenario. Thomas made sure to keep his prosthetic eye on wide angle, so that he had both the mech and the displayed battle damage assesment in its focus. The recording would be valuable when he got home. The performance was entirely as he expected, a solid match to the Taurians own two tee's at long range, but one hell of a nasty infighter up close. The SRMs made a real difference at short range, though more exhaustive testing would be needed to see if the new model would be worth adopting into general service. The intangibles couldn't be shown in a short test like this after all.

"How much would it be for me to get… twelve of your MMLs for testing purposes?" Thomas asked after the demonstration was over. While he had confidence that Taurian ingenuity would be able to match these Davion's it wouldn't hurt to have a couple of finished units on hand for the mech designers to play with while they were setting up their factory. "And a copy of the plans?"

"We could work out a deal," Andrew answered easily. "You think Pinard and TTI would both be interested?"

"Let me revise that, I'll need at least sixteen of those five racks for testing." Thomas was reminded yet again that these Davion's knew all too much about the Taurians industries.

"Doable," Theresa put in clearly bouncing on her toes in anticipation of something. "By the time your new chip forges are ready to be loaded up we'll have that many prototypes produced. We won't be holding up your departure."

"You aren't worried about official notice?" Thomas asked mildly. Internally his mind was racing. This was far too easy.

"Not when we're going to be claiming that we stole the initial design from you," Andrew replied with a grin. "After all you came to us with the MML data you got from the new Commando."

"There is that… you really think that will fly on New Avalon?"

"Ran Felsner is headed here with my oldest son," Andrew grinned as he said that. "That's a direct line to Hanse Davion's ear. We pass the specs on to him…"

"And all is forgiven." Thomas could see how that would work. He wasn't exactly pleased about helping the Davion's out… then again if LIC and more importantly to his mind Coventry Metal works legal department heard about the Davion's having their new technology before the Concordat got around to deploying it. He knew who would be blamed for the leak, and whose relations with the Commonwealth would suffer. He could actually pass that tidbit off to VMIs contract negotiators as a reason why they were so interested in a license for the new model Commando. It might not work, but it was better than admitting Coventry had accidentally sent them the data. That cheered Thomas up immensely, it was good to see the old Taurian standby of when in doubt blame the Davion's being useful.

"This should be good!" Theresa was almost rocking in excitement as a new Shadow Hawk entered the course.

Thomas could see a few differences. It did have the expected five rack of MMLs in place of its LRM system. The real difference though was in the Autocannon. Thomas at first dismissed what his eyes were telling him, and then found himself focusing in on it again as the size of the barrels registered. He had thought it was just another multi barrel auto cannon model, but the barrels were too big. Unable to help himself he zoomed in with his eye on the auto cannon and pursed his lips. Each of the six barrels looked to his eyes like a long-range AC, Whirlwind L if he didn't miss his guess, the same single barrel type which was used on the Blackjack. Widening his vision again he pulled back to observe.

What he saw was impressive. He had known what to expect from the MML system, but the autocannon. Oh, the autocannon was special. It could pump out a variable number of shots, from firing a single barrel, up to cutting loose with all six barrels at once. Checking the BDA board, he was pleased to see that his assessment had been right about the damage potential of each barrel, but wrong in the potential of the weapons system as a whole. Going at full bore it could do as much damage as the largest SRM system at the same range as the lightest autocannon.

While Thomas managed to keep his jaw together, and hide just how impressed he was, his military aid wasn't nearly as capable. Cornet Shraplen wasn't able to keep from staring in a mix of wide-eyed astonishment and white-faced terror. The teenager had been good enough to keep his mouth shut so far, but he couldn't contain himself anymore.

"How!?? What devilry is this? That shouldn't be possible! Even if you simplify the ammo feed system each of those barrels should be three tons." Grover was babbling in what Thomas estimated was sheer terror. He had thought better of the boy, before this trip he had thought of him as an up and comer, he really hadn't expected him to go to pieces like this. Especially since fitting an eighteen-to-twenty-one-ton weapon into a Shadow Hawk wasn't possible. Obviously, they had done something else, and logically if they were showing it off it meant he would be learning about it before the Davions managed to get it into general deployment.

"Grover, enough." Thomas said flatly ceasing the babble coming from his aid. Before he could apologize properly to the Duke the Shadow Hawk attempted a jump and locked up midair, crashing to earth in a tangle of limbs which indicated a Gyro failure. Emergency services seemed to appear out of thin air to converge on the downed mech and the duke was screaming into his com. Thomas pulled back and waited, finding himself next to Theresa who looked stricken at the accident. He saw the pilot get out, and stagger a bit before righting himself and waiving off the medics before he decided to speak.

"Bad luck, but it looks like your man got out without injury," Thomas allowed a note of commiseration to enter his voice as he said that. They might be Davion's but at least they were playing it fair with him.

"I don't understand," Theresa replied, white faced with shock and shame. "It was a brand-new chassis. We got it fresh from triple M, nothing had been installed on it. How could it give out like that. We've never had a problem with their quality control before."

"Triple M suffered a major engineering casualty last year, at least according to TMI, one of their auto welders stopped working as it should. If I don't miss my guess one of the data lines from the gyro to the central computer ripped off due to the jump." Thomas paused, noting that he had everyone's attention before continuing. Naturally he refrained from mentioning that TMI had thought that triple M had been using that as an excuse to retool to use the new Andurien developed medium range missiles on its next iteration of the venerable Shadow Hawk. Something they were keeping to themselves despite foreign relations best efforts. New Abilene was the mistake that just kept giving. "If that is what happened then I think we can confirm that rumor. Even with the accident though, I must say I'm impressed. That new autocannon of yours is something else."

"It was one of my husband's projects," Theresa said, clearly glad for the distraction. "He was trying to build a Code Red, but the metallurgy always seemed to come out wrong. This is the result of his last attempt before he passed away. He managed to get the barrel weight down, but he could never get the resulting material to accept the pressure needed to match the Code Red in performance. It's too brittle."

"Madam, if this is the result of one of his failures the entire sphere would tremble at his success." Thomas said flatly, trying to cheer the old woman up even as he considered what she had said. It was interesting data, mentally he revised his estimates on the range the new autocannon was capable of down. Even with that limitation in mind he thought that this was yet another game changing weapon to come out of the sphere, one he would have to see if he could get the specs on. If this new material could be scaled up then there were some real possibilities here, especially at the heavier end of the auto cannon range. Another thing to bring up with the designers back home.

"Hah, if I hadn't been pestering him, he never would have gotten these done. He always wanted to take the most efficient path, and say what you will about the rotary auto cannon it is not an efficient weapon. Brutal power? Oh yes, but not the clean one shot kill he wanted to develop. We have a larger bore version, but we haven't decided on what to mount it on yet so it hasn't gone beyond bench testing." Theresa grinned as she said that. "I can't wait to show that off."

"I thought you had decided to test it on the Icarus which just came off the lines?" Duke Andrew rejoined the conversation; he was trying to project a cheerful front but Thomas could tell he was worried behind the façade.

"A brand-new weapons system on a glorified second line machine, which a well-handled militia mech can beat, even one its own weight?" Theresa drew herself up in outrage. "Are you insane?"

"If we can prove it works then we can put it onto something more substantial." Andrew replied, his voice sharpening slightly. "If we could still make Talos then I would be all for putting it there, but we can't anymore." He carefully didn't mention the Swordsman they had fitted with the system. As open as he was being with their guests he didn't want to give away all of their secrets, just enough that the notoriously prickly Taurian's weren't panicked when Davion units started showing up on the border with new weapons systems. From the look of the military aid Thomas had brought with him that could have resulted in disaster. Better the Taurians got advanced warning so they weren't inclined to do something stupidly aggressive out of panic.

"Fucking Free World carpet baggers," Theresa mutter mutinously.

 

[GSpectre]

May 3rd​ 3015
Ducal Palace
Brockton, Federated Suns

"I trust that your visit has been to your liking?" Duke Andrew Brockton asked. Ardan Sortek had to restrain himself from saying something biting and sarcastic back. The duke and his staff had done a hell of a job distracting Ran Felsner and himself, they had a full itinerary from the moment they had stepped off the dropship until now. Admittedly what they were doing was important, but they were soldiers not show dogs to be trotted out to be shown off. It was perhaps the kindest most useful dodge that Ardan had ever seen, but given the lack of access to the duke it clearly had been a dodge.

"It was certainly informative," Ran replied mildly. "I was surprised by the attitude towards the star league I found on world. It seemed to be contrary to what most of inner sphere feels."

"I blame Louis," Andrew took a sip of his truly excellent wine before continuing. "He might not have been the heir but he was a duke's son and that gave him access to a rather large pile of resources. Given his experience in the periphery he spent pretty much all of it on a personal crusade to blacken the name of the star league. You saw some of his work when you visited the Pitcairn Museum."

"That was interesting," Ran admitted, not letting his true feelings show. Ardan barely contained a shudder as he remembered what had been contained inside. Full color tri vids of SLDF massacres, Blood bowls, and other war crimes, along with testimonials from survivors. It had been a chilling experience, although he could appreciate the emphasis placed on the role that Pitcairn and his legion had played in attempting to restrain the SLDF, they had at least acted like true knights.

"I was surprised to see Gladiators as part of the collection?" Ran continued. "The Talo's made sense, as did the battered remains of the Toro, but Gladiators? I had thought that they were a native Lyran design, expressly for the militia market." The Toro had been particularly disturbing, it was a shattered wreck having been physically beaten into that condition, at least to Ardan's experienced eye. The small plaque which memorialized the mechwarrior who had been trapped in it when that had happened had been particularly chilling.

"They started life as a Drac design, then the dracs screwed up a battle and rather than blaming the commander they naturally blamed the equipment, so they went about rewriting history with their typical brutality. Merriweather Industries in the hegemony, back when it was a going concern, bought the design documents to make a stab at independently developing a modern mech which the HAF turned down after ordering. By the time of the reunification war, they were known as a mercenary ride, so Pitcairn had little trouble getting enough of them to obfuscate the origins of the Legion." Andrew paused and wet his lips yet again. "That plan went out the window when he got a look at what Furlough was actually up to in the outworlds… But Louis kept his throughout the war."

"And the family didn't keep it operational?" Ardan's confusion was evident in his question. Not keeping a working mech going was unthinkable in this time.

"No access to spare parts." Andre replied with a shrug. "The three r was an inferior Dervish, and the four r could be replaced by a Wolverine easily enough. Better for the family to get machines which were still in production with parts available then to try and keep obsolete mechs running. Especially as we would have needed to machine up bespoke parts."

"You could have done it though," Ran jumped on the opportunity to bring up the reason they were out here on the edge of suns space.

"Sure, if we wanted to waste money." Brenda Brockton nee DeBrinion spoke up. She was substantially younger than her husband, and Ardan had thought her to be more a trophy wife than anything else. She seemed to know what she was talking about so he would need to amend his opinion yet again. The entire Brockton family seemed to be like that, more then what they appeared to be. "Better to use them as museum pieces and put the money we would have spent to use. Besides at that time our planetary industry was focused on the life sciences, most of our heavy industry was being shut down as uneconomical in the face of Terran competition."

"You revived your industry though," Ran said before popping a truly divine piece of mutton into his mouth. This curry was one of the best he had ever had outside of the former United Hindu Collective space, probably a subtle demonstration of the Brockton's political connections. He didn't have the time for that sort of political game and so ignored it in favor of the truly excellent food.

"Much later, and even then, it was only through subsidies we kept it going before the league fell." Brenda shrugged as she said that. "Without Takiro's fraud scaring us about our access to Terran exports we would never have spent the money."

"That's not quite accurate," Harry put in from where he had been demolishing his own meal with the steady workmanship of a career soldier. "We did keep up the funding for proper maintenance while it was mothballed back then. Otherwise, we never would have been able to pull it out of storage and start using it again."

"We didn't do it on our own," Andrew admitted with a grin. "Say what you will about the fat man, but he had an eye for dissatisfaction and knew exactly what buttons to push to get people hopping to his tune."

"I do wonder why your family was so open to collaborating with such a… character," Ardan's voice was filled with disgust. Collaborating with the man responsible for the fall of the Star League was in his mind beyond a family working with Satan.

"Because from our perspective the league wasn't delivering on its promises," Andrew's response was swift, his words a warning that even Ardan could understand. "We were promised economic prosperity, and that there would be funds available to upgrade our industry. It's why the family was initially so in favor of joining. Unfortunately, those benefits failed to materialize, and we were steadily marginalized and pushed out of what industries we retained in favor of Terran firms. Louis's tantrums didn't help matters, but we were hardly the only planet who didn't benefit. Several of our contemporaries experienced the same thing, and they didn't have nobles who were actively trying to assassinate hegemony 'heroes'. It didn't help that all of the veterans who returned from the Reunification war backed up Louis's version of events, which were rather different from what we got from the official news services. By the time of Takiro's fraud we were more than ready to have done with the whole thing."

"You expected the Star League to fall?" Ardan's voice was horrified.

"No, we expected that the Terran's would be distracted enough by the periphery that we could benefit the way Panpour had. The thinking was that we were in a perfect position to snag an SLN transport command contract, which would come with modern upgrades for our refit yard, possibly all the way up to a production facility. Being in safe space about halfway between the two perspective battle grounds? That seemed like a sure bet to the family back then. Of course, we were wrong but…" Andrew shrugged his shoulders. "No one thought that Amaris was that crazy. Still, you work with who you can, not who you want too."

"Like the heir to the Taurian Concordat?" Ran's question was mild but Ardan could almost feel the tension rachet up around the room.

"I presume that's what brought you all the way out here from New Avalon?" Brenda kept up a façade of normalcy but then tension around her eyes was obvious.

"As you say."

"That's why you asked me to resign and head home?" Harry's voice was mild, but there was anger lurking in it.

"No, I asked you to do that long before Thomas showed up unexpectedly," Andrew reassured his son. "Collin had a breakthrough before his untimely passing and I needed someone I could trust to get it in front of the first prince. Given how many of our confidential communications have ended up on New Syrtis instead of New Avalon I wanted it to be done in person by someone who both sides could trust. Given your position in the Heavy Guards that put you in the hot seat."

"It's gotten that bad?" Harry asked, his anger forgotten as concern filled his frame.

"Trevlu has been getting a lot of unofficial pressure from New Syrtis, so much so that Prakash Azad had to suspend operations in the Capellan March." Andrew's casual name drop of the CEO of Trevlu Mechworks was enough to make both Ran and Ardan sit up just a little bit straighter. "Ajeet isn't nearly as affected but that's because they are newer and less well known. I know that Kirsh Singh, Roger Garg, and several of the other dukes in the former collective worlds have been monopolizing Basantapur's production for the past year or so. Given they are closer to the situation then I am I'm not inclined to second guess their instincts."

"Given Max recently announced that the Home guard would be getting a new militia mech, it's no surprise that Michael is beefing up his march. Especially with Candace Liao announcing the Firebee will be back in production shortly," Ran put delicately, he clearly didn't believe Candace's announcement any more than his listeners, but he was aware enough of the strategic situation to know it was an outside possibility that the Liao's had gotten access to the Kurita's seemingly endless stockpile of machine tools.

"After a century and a half, the Liao's finally are going to admit that Ilsa's display of brilliance wasn't enough on its own." Andrew's response was derisive. "Everyone's known for more then fifty years that the CCAF needed to either up production of the Vindicator or start acquiring militia mechs. The only reason they haven't before now was that it was politically impossible for the Liao family to admit that their propaganda about how the CCAF and home guards had proper mechs as opposed to the FWLM and AFFS due to the impressive foresight of Ilsa Liao was so much shit."

"Dad…" Harry tried to interrupt his father, but the older man was on a roll.

"We could have done that, the Swordsman is a better all rounder then the Vindicator, but between the history and the fucking Corean marketing department paying to keep the mech in disrepute, the AFFS and march militias have been hamstrung by politics."

"If the Swordsman is so easy to produce why isn't the Icarus more common?"

"Corean again, they pretend to hold that license almost exclusively and the last time we tried to expand production away from Brockton… let's just say that the legal fees were daunting."

"Not to mention the battalion of mercs who showed up on Tsamma after it started looking like Corean's claims were going to be laughed out of court as they should have been to begin with," Brenda reminded her husband.

"Those were pirates dear, ask anyone." Andrew's voice was filled with sarcasm. "Despite the targeted nature of the raid, taking out only the refit yard and associated industry, along with the standard mercenary transmission DMI and MIIO both agreed that it was a pirate action. Not that the finding stopped complaints when we hung the bastards."

"That was because you hired them on a garrison contract and then captured and executed them years after they had performed their raid on Tsamma." Brenda's voice was filled with disapproval. "That was a mistake."

"It got the message across to the rest of the mercenary community."

"Because not being able to hire mercenaries is a good thing." Brenda rolled her eyes. "Prakash and the rest of the board are still pissed with you for that stunt. The only reason the backlash was as mild as it was is that they had been reduced in size to a company."

"As interesting as this history is, perhaps we can bring the conversation back around to what the Heir to the Taurian Concordat was doing here?" Ardan asked in exasperation, interrupting what was looking to be a massive family fight that he did not want to have front row seats to.

"Oh, that…" Brenda settled down a bit before continuing. "VMI got a new weapon out of Coventry due to an engineering snafu on their Commando lines which required Coventry to transmit some additional data. Coventry screwed up and put too much into the transmission, giving the Taurians a first look at the new model Commando set to be released next year. Thomas was hoping we could sell him the machine tooling he needed to put it into production."

"Seeing as he needed to let us see the blue prints in order to get him the needed machine tools I was inclined to agree." Andrew grinned as he said that. "We put it into full production a month after he left for home and have been playing with refits since he told us what he wanted. Combined with Collins breakthrough… I think we might finally have a Swordsman the AFFS will accept."

"What sort of system is it?" Ardan found himself leaning forward with interest. "The one Thomas wanted you to duplicate I mean."

"It's a production model of the old multi missile launcher idea," Andrew said with a grin. "We have a demonstration set up tomorrow for you both to look at everything we have… I think you'll like it."

 

[GSpectre]

Not a story post, but something I've been meaning to do for a while as we aren't going to be seeing all of the backstory for this AU in story for a bit. Hopefully it's at least coherent in explaining where militia tech comes from, and whos using what. Plus a few bits and bobs for the culture vultures


excerpted from; Innovations and Adaptations, technological development in a time of decline.
Arnold Duchamp, Dean of the College of Political Administration (Ret.)
NAIS Historical press 3085


Militia mechs are an odd confluence of political and military development, the genesis for their creation lay in the separation of the Principality of Gibson and the Principality of Regulus in 2699 and the subsequent political strife. It came to a head in 2837 when the Free Worlds League was interdicted after catching ComStar in the usual Terran practices, and responding in a completely understandable way. The Principality of Gibson's political leadership, seeing a chance to frustrate their former lieges, diverted the entire military production of the province to the FWLM in a display of loyalty to Charles Marik. Included in the materials diverted were more then a regiment of already paid for mechs, and other sundry equipment, purchased by the Cameron-Jones family as a means to rebuild the 2nd​ and 3rd​ Regulan Hussars. The Cameron-Jones family, having there attempt to secure the loyalty of their provincial forces undermined by outsiders, reacted with predictable anger.

Regulan Dropships and fighter carriers, crewed by Regulan militia, began an embargo of the Principality of Gibson. By the end of 2838 the situation had gotten so bad, both on the ground in the Principality and in military terms for the FWLM as critical supplies were interdicted by the Regulans, Midge Allison stepped in to attempt to resolve the situation diplomatically. With the ending of the interdiction, and the federal court ruling on Atreus which firmly rebuked the Principality of Gibson for their blatant contract violation, a compromise was reached.

Prince Andronache Cameron-Jones attempted to use the incident to force FWDI to relocate at least some of their facilities to Regulus proper. It was a demand too far, as no one was willing to endanger the leagues fragile military production in the middle of a war, but one she refused to back down from. Finally, a compromise was reached with the Principality of Gibson supplying the industrial tools needed for a battlemech facility. Given the state of industrial tooling production in the league at the time it should come as no surprise to the reader when the tooling arrived it was not what she had been promised. Midge Allison was forced to step in again, remembering the fabled Sarissa, he provided the plans needed to put that primitive machine into production as a stop gap until the deal was fulfilled. While that never occurred, the introduction of the Sarissa to Regulan forces allowed the Cameron-Jones family an outsized influence in league politics over the following years.

Using their natively produced Sarissa's the Cameron-Jones family stood up the 11th​ and 12th​ Regulan Hussars as a pirate hunting force in the Rim Commonality and Regulan Fifes. Their second line nature meant that they were not called to the front like their sister regiments, giving the Prince of Regulus a powerful political tool. Charles Marik, after his return from his successful defense of Iran, was intrigued by the idea. In the hopes of reducing the use of the home defense act he added a subsidy to the 2845 league budget to stand up further production sites of militia grade equipment. From there the idea exploded across the League, with each province attempting to put out their own mechs. While most of these smaller manufacturers failed by the official end of the second succession war, they did have a remarkable military effect. Front line units, especially provincial units, were deployed to the front at a higher rate then they had been allowing the FWLM to push back the gains made by the LCAF and CCAF.

Used as rear area security, and provincial protection forces, the primitive renaissance had begun. League based manufacturers began to dig deep into their archives to put out their own offerings to take advantage of this new market. Some units were notable failures like the reintroduced trooper (See FWL-Circinus Federation war of 2850), but most did their duty. By the end of the Second Succession War Free Worlds based manufacturers had come up with a healthy stable of primitive mechs under their new marketing label: militia mechs; Orion's, OstWars, Hectors, Icarus, Griffins, and the Sarissa.


A Tale of Two responses

By 2850 it was clear on both Sian and Tharkad that something was allowing the FWLM to deploy far more of their forces to the front lines then had been though possible. Investigations by the LIC and MASK swiftly determined the cause, the political response couldn't have been more divergent. On Sian Chancellor Laurelli Liao declared the militia mech a flawed concept developed in response to her blessed mother's foresight in developing the Vindicator. Declaring that her valiant warriors would not suffer from inferior equipment like the Sassenach guilo nekulturny of the league she increased production of the Vindicator, keeping her response almost entirely political.

In the Lyran Commonwealth there was a radically different response. The regency council, seeing a way to repair the damage done to the Steiner name by Claudius the Cruel, openly embraced the concept. Tenders were put out to all mech producers while a frantic search for an answer to the Sarissa was launched. Coventry responded by putting the Ymir and original Commando back into production, Star Corps offered the original LongBow, while the O'Leary family managed to salvage Mountain Wolf Battlemechs by acquiring MacEnroe motors and putting out the Crossbow, as well as licensing it to all who asked. With the exception of the never completely satisfactory Crossbow, all of the companies involved flatly refused to license their designs to the smaller manufacturers who sprung up to take advantage of the grants that the Steiner family was offering.


The program the regency council had put into place was succeeding in its military objectives, but failing in its political ones. While there were a plethora of designs coming out of the Commonwealth, they lacked a solid trooper which could be subject to an open license like the free worlds Sarissa. Then the newly formed Apollo Mechworks released the Phoenix, which while it was what was being sought was absolutely the wrong mech from a political standpoint. The regency was trying to emphasize the caring nature of the Steiner family, not imply that they were the Amaris's reborn. Loki was dispatched to deal with Apollo, and a frantic search of LIC's archives was begun. The regency no longer cared about intellectual property, so long as it was held by a foreign entity, they needed an answer now.

Fortunately for the Commonwealth LIC had the answer in its archives. When Merryweather Industries exited the Battlemech market LIC had acquired all of their documentation in an effort to divine Hegemony manufacturing techniques, including their intellectual property. Having located a solution, the Gladiator was licensed to anyone who had a hint of production capacity, usually for little more then a single Kroner, an answer to the Sarissa had been found…

Echoes across the Sphere

The Federated Suns, and the Draconis Combine, initially ignored the revolution which was occurring. While the Suns lacked the industrial means to take advantage, as shown by their later attempts at adopting the Lyran model, the Combine's contempt for the LCAF led to their deliberate ignorance of the effects militia mechs had. When the third Succession War broke out, the DCMS found their assaults rapidly flagging as their more advanced machines were forced to wade through rivers of Lyran militia mechs. While the Lyran adoption of the Militia mech did not cure the ills of the LCAF, it did allow them to blunt the initial assault and hold their ground.

Kurita samurai were highly offended by the entire premise of a militia mech, likening it to handing an inferior sword to your loyal retainers, despite that distaste the DCMS would eventually have been forced to adopt the militia mech if they had not successfully recovered several Jenner lines. The recovery of front-line production allowed Miyogi Kurita an opportunity he used ruthlessly to smear his sister Roweena Kurita who through the offices of the PRE had been advocating for the adoption of a militia mech of the dragons own. Being a concept that was embraced by the losing side of a dynastic struggle the Dragon would refrain from adoption, concentrating their considerable industrial efforts on rebuilding their industries with at least some success.

Michael Davion, enamored as he was with the business community despite the failure of his money for peace initiative, used his late entry into the third succession war to try and emulate the Steiner's. His attempts were marred by similar problems to those which were encountered by the regency council, namely the lack of a flagship design which he could disseminate. Kallon was willing to put the original Wolverine into production, Star corps Crofton had little trouble following the lead of Son Hoa and putting out a Longbow, Corean offered up the Icarus, and Achernar put the Dervish, Battleaxe, and Hammerhands on the table. Unfortunately for Michael, licensing quickly became a point of contention to such a degree that the court costs began to eat into the industrial support budget. Despite his best efforts most of the smaller manufacturers he had sought to create folded rapidly as the subsidies dried up.

The only notable success stories that Michael's subsidies achieved in creating smaller manufacturers were Robinson Mechworks, who in a rather unusual move licensed the OstWar from Kong Interstellar, and Trevlu Mechworks who merged with a gutted Corean subsidiary. Finally, on the verge of entering the third succession war Michael took the unusual step of buying out the Battleaxe from Achernar as his flagship, a move that had he made it just a few years prior would have substantially aided his efforts. As it was, for most manufacturers the support was too little too late.

 

[GSpectre]

August 12th​ 3015
Sondra Black Memorial Ball Room, Mt Davion
New Avalon, Federated Suns

"No, you have to understand, militia mechs aren't like battlemechs. They exist on a spectrum." Harry Brockton pontificated to one of the New Avalon born nobles. She was cute enough, but he couldn't be bothered to remember her name. The lack of spurs, and complete ignorance on military matters made her inconsequential to him… or perhaps it was the three scotches he had already indulged in. It didn't help that she was from one of the golden five, and despite his families' best efforts they were best remembered in the popular histories as biological warfare specialists.

A point he had been reminded of for his entire time on world. Between the stress of making sure that the prototype mechs they would be leaving for the AFFS to test out would be returned, negotiating a reasonable license for their version of the mml system with the chancellor of the exchequer, and fielding questions and complaints from the barrowed crucis march militia pilots about when they could get back to their unit on top of knowing that the Brockton family had depleted their defensive forces in order to provide the frames needed for their demonstration he was swiftly reaching the end of his rope. The added stress that came from a stream of noble snubs he had endured because of his family meant he was more then ready to kick back a relax.

"A mech's a mech, isn't it?" the girl asked with a raised eyebrow.

"Nope. A proper battlemechs more than the sum of its parts. We at Trevlu Brockton manage to make a few of them every year, but we need to import at least some of the parts. The engines for example, those take much more precision than our machine tools can manage. Militia mechs on the other hand? Those we do, and we do them well. Our offerings are mid-range though."

"Explain this spectrum then," the girls eyes narrowed and she gave him a suspicious look. "Because none of my highly paid tutors have mentioned anything about that, and I'm on the list for Albion."

"Right… Bottom of the barrel, something like the Quasit. Purely civilian construction, basically anything that complies with the SecurityMech treaty of 2613. Most sensible people consider them to be security mechs, but they are used in a militia role for poorer systems. A step up from that are the lighter so called primitive mechs, they use older construction techniques and have looser tolerances. The downside to that is anything under sixty tons is questionable on the battlefield unless its in a specialized role. The Icarus and Swordsman we at Trevlu make would count as this."

"Not the Whitworth?"

"Nah, that's a specialized roll. A militia grade tin man can hang with all up battlemechs as long as it stays in its lane. It's not as good as an all-up battle mech, but I would feel confident taking one of our militia grade Whitworths against one of Coreans Icarus II's." Harry finished off his fourth glass of scotch and put it onto the tray of a passing waiter. "Next up you have the heavier offerings, sixty tons and up, and those which like I said have a specialized roll. Our Whitworth, Achernars militia grade Dervish which is made right here on New Avalon, are examples of lighter offerings that fill a roll well enough that they qualify for this level. Otherwise, you have things like Robinson Mech Works OstWar, Kallon's Wolverine, or the Trevlu Battleaxe."

"Interesting you don't call it yours, considering your position with the company?"

"Brockton doesn't make it, so I can't rightfully call it ours." Harry gave the girl a disarming smile. "We do put together the next step up, but that layer of the continuum is in dispute. Bottom end battlemechs are still battlemechs after all."

"But you consider them to be militia mechs. So, bug mechs?"

"No, those have a roll on the battlefield." Harry shrugged. "It's more things like Corean's Icarus II, mechs that aren't quite enough to really fill the role their shoved into."

"And your own Swordsman doesn't qualify for that?" a smooth voice from a red headed man Harry didn't recognize through the alcohol he had drunk spoke up.

"Swordsman can take an Icarus II any day of the week, twice on Sunday. Their only real competition for the title of best low-end medium is the Vindicator." Harry shrugged off the implied criticism easily. "Some might argue the Blackjack is competition, but its long-range punch isn't up to the job. Short range? Nasty little buggers are hell on wheels but the Swordsman is fast enough to keep out of range, and even at the base 2T configuration's a nasty enough infighter to make any sane 'jack driver think twice. The new refits we're going to be putting out in the next couple of years? Those can take and keep the crown. The problem with the Swordsman isn't its prowess on the battlefield, its political, morons on New Avalon keep reinforcing its status as a symbol of disloyalty. Doesn't help that the various first princes have been hoodwinked enough that it's not an accepted chassis for front line service in the AFFS."

"And what makes you so sure that there were morons on new Avalon instead of there being solid reasons why the mech wasn't acceptable?" the red head asked seemingly interested. Harry noted that there seemed to be a bubble of space forming around him and ignored it, in favor of snagging another of the excellent scotches.

"Because there are always morons infesting this planet!" Harry threw up his arms in exasperation. "Industrial policy? Oh, lets make sure we're dependent on terra and when that proves to be a mistake lets take what our loyal retainers have managed to retain and give it away to foreigners! Foreigners are hitting our vassals as they try to rebuild what was stolen? Oh, their headquarters is here, lets back them up rather then slapping them down like we should. We designed and made a better machine for its role? Let's side line it politically and pay for a foreign designed piece of shit. Education? Have you read a history books? We prop up the moronic veneration of a Terran born, Lyran trained, social general who only survived giving the Drac's an advantage over the AFFS because he was too stupid to read a damn map, and then was instrumental in covering the DCMS's murder of his commanding officers, rather than our own native-born son who carried the moron to victory despite his massive strategic blunders. The Suns would be so much better off if we weren't dragged down by consistent mistakes originating on New Avalon."

"That's certainly a take," the red head said skeptically. "Not sure what it has to do with the Swordsman, but it's a take."

"Evidence of consistently bad decision making, and prioritizing foreign interests over those native to the suns as a matter of policy." Harry shrugged and threw back his scotch, ignoring the looks of horror he was getting from the people who were in earshot. It felt good to unburden a bit to a new Avalon asshole, and it wasn't as if he was going to see the man again after all. A few more days and he would be on his way to the Commonwealth with the First Princes blessing, parlaying new developments into bounties for his family firm before their advantages and secrets could be given away.

"Like your own upcoming venture into the commonwealth?"

"Nah, that's a rare bit of sense. First Prince has to know we have a limited window before our newest secrets are stolen, better to trade for what we can get then have foreign relations and the department of procurement give our secrets away for nothing, again. Lord knows Corean's corporate headquarters here are a direct line to Atreus, and the department of procurement is going to want them to update their pieces of shit rather than buying the Swordsman or supporting Achernar's Enforcer like they should… again."

"The Centurion is a good workhorse…"

"Achernar's Enforcer is just as good and it's a native development, and with a little bit of funding I would bet they can put the Hammerhand's back into production, both of which are much more useful platforms for deploying our new advantages then the Centurion and Icarus II and they aren't imports. Not to mention their Dervish could really benefit from the Lyran advances we have access to. Besides supporting the Swordsman is a good way to develop drop in upgrade packages for the Shadow Hawk, rather than wasting pounds on a dead end like upgrading the Icarus." Harry sighed heavily as he said that. "But that's not how its going to go. The Centurion is going to be prioritized because Corean can get it done faster. Never mind they're going to do it by importing their specialists from the league. The Swordsman is going to be sidelined again, and new upgrades for the Shad are going to be developed by Kallon, rather then use what we already have. Which of course will be the excuse for why theirs no money in the budget for helping smaller manufacturers upgrade their plants, again."

"And if you were in charge, how would you combat this alleged bias?" The red head asked, annoyance creeping into his voice so obviously that even in Harrys inebriated state he could hear it.

"I've got seven upgraded mechs on my dropship as show pieces for the march militia; two Shadow Hawks, three Swordsmen, a Whitworth, and an Icarus II." Harry replied easily. "DMI or any AFFS command could attach an eighth so we had two lances, and they could have a trustworthy evaluator along, then let me take my people over the border, either one, and take a look at the results. Doesn't cost anything, and gives everyone in the Foxes Den an idea of how their simulations stack up to reality. Then when I'm proven right let MIIO off the leash to sniff out where the corruption was in the evaluations the AFFS ran."

"You know, that sounds like an excellent idea." The red head straightened and waved over an older woman with fading red hair which had at one point matched his own. "Yvonne, have any raids we don't have the forces to pull off at the moment?"

"A couple, why my prince?" Yvonne Davion, grandmother of the AFFS answered, and it suddenly hit Harry just who he had been going off on.

"Harry Brockton here just agreed to take an evaluator with him and run a real-world test of the designs that are being evaluated. I thought we could help him out and give him a target." Hanse Davion, the first prince, smirked as he said that.

"Well. fuck." Was the only reply Harry could think to make.

 

[GSpectre]

August 14th​ 3015
Maharaja Palace
Basantapur, Federated Suns

"My son is an idiot… and my wife is going to be telling me I told you so for the next three decades," Andrew Brockton's exasperation was obvious to his listeners. He had been an unexpected but welcome visitor, bringing with him enough machine tooling to build an engine line for Trevlu's front line offerings. Between the tooling they had acquired from Jalastar, and the new engine line when it was completed, Basantapur-Trevlu was finally in a position to produce front line quality battlemechs. It was an investment that Roger Garg had been lobbying for most of the last two decades to achieve. His success had only come after he had convinced the Messengers of Shiva to station a battalion of mechs and their support troops on Basantapur to supplement Trevlu security and the local militia.

"Harry? An idiot?" Roger Garg asked mildly. His elegantly sculpted eyebrow barely rising as he flicked his tailored silk cuff out of the way of his coffee. He had been in danger of getting the embroidery ruined, a constant concern dressing the way he did. He would have been much happier in the overalls he had worn throughout his service as an AFFS tech, but the demands of his position no longer allowed him to be unconcerned with his image.

"New Avalon?" Prakash Azad grunted out his question from where he was hunched over his breakfast. His dark face still turned down while he focused on his meal with mechanical precision. "Who did he kill?"

"My family doesn't feel the need to be violent to establish our position," Andrew responded while turning his nose up and shifting his voice into a parody of a New Avalon noble. "Having been leading members of the upper crust in the suns for centuries we are above such plebian things. We would never be so crass as to do something like that personally."

"No," Prakash snorted as he looked at the two nobles he was seated with. When he had been younger, he would never have pictured himself here. As the son of a casual laborer, and a Dalit, he should have ended up working the same job as his father and living a life of quiet desperation. Fortunately for him he had met Roger Garg while serving in the AFFS, and his solid dependability had gotten him pulled up the social ladder. "You nobles would hire out the kill and make sure that you had the chance to loot the poor fool's residence down to bedrock yourselves. Because obviously a hireling would screw up the more important part."

"Exactly!" Roger agreed cheerfully with his long-time friend and subordinate. "It's good to see you have adjusted into being a proper noble after all this time. Why it feels like it was just the other day you were so crass as to beat a man to death with your own two hands, and you hired out the ransacking of his residence! Such a Nouveau riche thing to do…"

All three men laughed at the continuing joke. It did hold an edge of uncomfortable truth to it, but they had known each other long enough that it could be ignored in the name of levity. They hadn't always gotten along, Andrew having been almost apocalyptically angry when Roger had put Prakash into the CEOs chair without so much as a by your leave to Trevlu's largest shareholder, but they had worked together for years. There was an easy familiarity and a level of trust built up. Especially given that Roger had been proven right about Prakash within a fortnight.

"So, what did Harry do, and how much backlash should I expect to be coming out of New Avalon?" Prakash asked, levity leaving his face.

"He thought that a ball in Mount Davion was a good time to relax and drink too much, then he mouthed off to the First Prince." Andrew sighed as he admitted that. "I thought he had enough time to decompress while he was home, but it seems my wife was right again. It shouldn't do us any real damage, especially since he was correct in his mouthing off. Mostly about New Avalon's seeming obsession with Corean at the expense of our native companies."

"So, I should batten down the hatches and check that our cash reserves are good." Prakash's face settled into his characteristic frown. "Got it."

"No really it isn't that bad. He actually got the first prince to assign him a raid to test what he was saying."

"How fast can we get Brenda from Brockton over to the commonwealth?" Roger asked seriously. He was by now well aware of the Brockton family dynamics, Andrew handled the business end of things with a ruthless determination that a lyran magnate would admire while Brenda handled soothing ruffled feathers of the bruised noble egos Andrew left in his wake. For a girl who had grown up on a skid row world she had a real sense for politics which Andrew lacked, something they would need if Harry took after his father as much as this incident indicated he did.

"No need, she was on Robinson." Andrew shook his head at the over reaction of his business partners and friends. "I already sent a message to her."

"What was she doing on Robinson?" Prakash asked suspiciously. "She wasn't trying to get the Sandoval's to back upgrading the Tsamma plant again, was she?"

"Nothing like that," Andrew said hastily waving his hands as if to ward away the very idea. "The DMM captured a pair of Liberties from some pirates out by the alliance. They're mostly wrecked but the cores are reported to still be intact."

"Andrew… you have factors for that kind of work. You don't send your biggest political gun out on a routine buying trip." Roger's disbelief over Andrew's protestations of innocence wasn't hidden.

"There might have been a bit of a meeting with the Sandoval's. They've been trying to get a license to produce spares for the Whitworth out of Corean for the last decade…"

"Oh, bloody hell." Roger reached up with his free hand and pinched the bridge of his nose. "I know your family has something of a vendetta with Corean but seriously?"

"They reached out to us," Andrew's protest was weak and he knew it. "Its more about giving them leverage then anything else, favor trading for a later date. It's not like they're going to accept that we have the authority to grant the license they want after all. Even if it is legally ours."

"Probably a good idea…" Prakash paused clearly thinking before continuing. "Does this… incident… change any of our plans?"

"It might make things a little tighter than I would like…" Roger responded staring off into space blankly and ignoring the spectacular view of the mountains that dominated his dining room windows.

"Not really." Andrew held up his hands defensively as the other two men glared at him. "We weren't going to be getting all of our factories into the front line production business, just the ones with existing tooling. That's going to be the point where an incident like this could really trip us up. Harry's instructions are to get our MML system legal, and not labeled a pirated copy, using any means necessary. That's probably going to be through Defiance but who knows? The Lyran legal system might work to our advantage here, after all they aren't going to want Coventry to be their exclusive supplier, and to see if Mountain Wolf would be amenable to selling some of their catalog."

"I'll admit that's the part I don't get. Not having a regiment or two of mercs dropped on my head because I ignored legalities is something I understand well enough… but Mountain Wolf? Why not go straight for Coventry?" Prakash asked, he hadn't been included in the discussion over what was to be acquired. Mostly because neither of the nobles wanted him to see them engage in what was very close to an all-out brawl over their differing ideas of where Trevlu should focus their efforts in the coming years.

"Because Coventry is going to be pissed at us for stealing data from them." Roger admitted, privately he was still smarting about that point. He had thought that this was the perfect opportunity to add the Ymir to their lineup. An assault mech, even a militia grade one, was a statement of power one he badly wanted. Especially after he had spent almost a decade worth of the R and D budget getting the specifications for the Striker into something they could manufacture after Lycomb Davion Introtech had refused to even meet with his representative over the possibility of putting the Awesome into production. The Striker was hardly ideal, but it could be adapted to take a two forty rated engine, and they could make those at Ajeet Aerospace. Unfortunately, Andrew's point had won out in the end.

"Everyone knows Brandon O'Leary wants to get his company back into the battlemech game in the worst way. He's not happy being confined to a militia mech producer, and we can use that in the future. We trade some tech, and maybe a license, and a couple million Kroner to him for his connections and the MacEnroe catalog? That's going to be useful down the road when we want to make the full jump from militia mechs ourselves." Andrew said seriously. "I know you both think I'm reckless at times, but, I'm well aware that we can't make that jump openly yet. We have a bit of production at my Brockton site, some more being built here, but…"

"Crossbow isn't really worth it." Prakash frowned again as he thought through what he knew about MacEnroe Motors. Like a lot of the companies which had designed the militia mechs used today it was long out of business and therefore the contents of its design catalogue weren't well known. "What are we really getting? Because if its just the Crossbow and connections? We would be better off sticking in the Suns and working with Achernar for their Dervish militia mech. It has a better reputation, and they have political capital we could actually use."

"It's not just the mech we're after," Roger admitted easily. "It's the Marsden plans and the Buffel. Both of which we can put into production here on Basantapur…"

"And being a tank and a combat support vehicle, we can easily upgrade to modern standard…" Prakash smiled as he saw the shape of the plan he would be expected to execute. It seemed that Andrew hadn't taken leave of his senses and was trying to grow their cash reserves before making an open move. "Doable. We already make the Tiger here… That takes care of the engine. Marsden isn't really going to expand our share of the militia market, but it should be a solid earner especially if we slap some of the new weapons on it… Buffel though… That might just be the ticket into the AFFS supply chain. We put out a good enough version and it might just be accepted into front line units."

"I have every confidence in your engineering teams." Andrew agreed obliquely. "They should be finishing up the first of the Tiger updates we asked of them by the time we actually have plans in hand. Besides the AFFS has never been truly happy with their engineering vehicles, and none of the larger concerns are looking at the market. Our competition will be Quickscell."

"Who we can blow out of the water on our build quality alone, no matter how poor of an offering we put out." Roger tipped his coffee towards Andrew in acknowledgement of the point which had won him the argument last night. Well that and their critical lack of tooling, without the backing of an existing battlemech manufacturer getting ahold of the right grade of tooling was a challenge. Especially given how little was made in the Suns, the truth was they would need to import and that cost more then their cash reserves could realistically be stretched to cover.

"But not on price." Prakash pursed his lips. "Don't get too comfortable with this plan of yours, Quickscell has stayed in business despite their abysmal reputation because of their ability to drop below their cost if they feel the need in order to kill their competition. We're going to need to do some heavy lobbying to get the AFFS to accept the price bump."

"That's going to be Roger's job, I think my family has blown up that bridge for the moment…" Andrew admitted. "Rogers family has always had better contacts on New Avalon, and a better reputation, then my own."

"Yes, because bringing an intact and functional political unit into the suns without bloodshed is much more respectable then conspiring with a periphery barbarian to bring down the star league." Roger poked at his friend, indicating that the serious discussions were done for the moment.

"I never should have let you in on that bit of family history," Andrew groaned and face palmed in exasperation.

"Like father, like son, get a Brockton drunk and they'll do something stupid." Roger replied lightly.

"Yes, because I was the one who had to be bailed out of jail for pissing on a statue of Parvati and then arguing with the police officer that what you were doing was judging from how the priests acted a recognized form of worship for your caste." Andrew shot back.

"Hey! I had just spent a week trying to get the damn assembly to push through yet another anti caste discrimination law when that happened." Roger grinned as he said that. "A bit of harmless blasphemy is hardly the most extreme reaction to dealing with that sort of idiocy."

"You're both idiots in your own special way," Prakash said firmly, but with a mirk lurking at the corner of his lips. While the police and priests had been distracted by Roger's very public act of blasphemy someone had been busy setting the temple compounds office building on fire. Strange how a lot of political opposition to that bill had disappeared afterwards, it was almost like a load of blackmail files had been kept there. "Let's not have another incident like last time, yes? I had to spend all too much of our slush fund keeping both your antics out of the media last year."

 

[GSpectre]

August 19th​ 3015
Brockton HPG
Brockton, Federated Suns

Precentor Max Quin felt a creeping exhaustion as he nodded to the Adept who was actually operating the HPG today. He had cleared the transmission room for this meeting, but he still felt that it was a mistake. He already had enough problems due to decisions made far beyond his level, having the lower ranked Adepts know that he was being called to the carpet wouldn't exactly help him get a handle on the situation on world. Despite his objections Precentor New Avalon had insisted on a live feed, despite the tremendous waste of resources it represented. A tone sounded through the room and Max joined in with the prayer before the holo sprang to life, displaying Precentor Vandel, resplendent in his formal white robes.

"Peace of Blake be upon you Precentor Brockton," Huthrin's strong baritone, well trained in oratory over his years on the first circuit rang through the room.

"In Blakes name I serve," Max replied evenly, grateful he had managed to keep the trepidation out of his voice. "How may I aid the first circuit in following Blakes will today?"

"Explain to me just what is going on out there," Huthrin dropped the rituals and theatrics, diving straight to the point. "We have heard almost nothing out of Brockton since Holy shroud wrapped up, and now they are in the weapons development business?"

"Precentor, they have been in the weapons development business for years. An act we have been encouraging as long as they kept to the conventional roads. The fragmentation which the blessed Blake predicted is predicated on the nobility's comfort in feeding their vices. We have, as policy, cleared the way for imports from the outworlds as a means to hide the declining tech level of this system. It was thought that through this device we could induce the fragmentation which is inevitable, and through strategic actions assure our eventual ascension." Max knew he was about to go onto dangerous ground here and took a deep breath before continuing.

"The first circuit has, as a matter of policy, encouraged local development of militia grade gear. It encourages nobles to think they are stronger than they actually are, and we have gone to great lengths to prevent dissemination of the known vulnerabilities of said gear. Unfortunately, here in the suns the first circuit badly over estimated their industrial strength, forcing them to face their weakness head on and innovate around the problem. To make matters worse, political decisions have been made which seem to have been designed to tweak the noses of the locals."

"Your appointment…" Huthrin stated flatly.

"My appointment. It was a direct slap in the face not only to the nobility but the common people who look to our guidance. While it was in some ways understandable… having a supposed Highspire trained chemist as precentor here was a political mistake." Max leaned back, both men were well aware that the closest he had ever come to Highspire was a brief sojourn on Liao while with the Light of Mankind, and then continued. "I believe I am up to the task of being a Precentor, but in this system my cover identity is a provocation and a reminder of the horrors of the first and second wars, and who led them through said blood bath. Support for Davion has been firming up, where as before my appointment it was on a downward trajectory."

"I understand the delicate position which certain factions have put you in, but I still need to explain just what happened." Huthrin's voice was merciless as he pressed the junior man. He didn't want to admit it, but Allen Rusenstiens revenge for supporting his ouster had been a brilliant political move. It had created on ongoing headache which the rest of the first circuit was watching with glee along with sharpening their political knives to elevate their own proteges should he fail to properly contain it. "New weapons systems don't just pop out of thin air after all…"

"In this case it's a combination of our programs. We have been encouraging Brockton to spread what remains of their knowledge base, causing a spike in the educated work force in this region of space while driving down the level of known scientific facts, which is a self-sustaining reaction as basic science fails to find funding due to the fact that what the scientists are looking for is known in systems which have kept their knowledge beyond the level that was known to the alliance. Coupled with our encouragement of the development of a lower tech industrial base in this region of space? A lot of known shortcuts have had to be rediscovered causing a general rise in the inventiveness and adaptability of the engineers who are educated here. This broad-based depression of knowledge was deemed to be the best compromise available to us, while maintaining the balance of power."

"We all know how well that went." Huthrin grunted in annoyance, disliking how Max was regurgitating facts that were already known to him. "So basically, what you're telling me is that because we didn't allow Krupp and the like to be pigs in a trough like we did in the Combine they needed to adapt."

"Exactly. It doesn't help that the local ROM contingent is constantly haring off on the perennial wild goose chase that is the mythical core forges the alliance supposedly put out here. Or their obsession with the TAS Philadelphia being somewhere in system, I seriously doubt that ship ended up docked or abandoned out here. It would be nice if we could recover her, if only to keep the myth that the Dreadnought was the first warship and to relieve ROMs budget from spreading that fantastical story about her loss around, but that won't happen in this system. Brockton was a scientific colony, focused on terra forming during the alliance and it was a matter of policy even back then not to allow critical infrastructure like a core forges, or weapons production, out of the Sol system. Between that, ensuring that redevelopment of higher-level industry doesn't happen, and keeping an eye on the college for any signs of relapsing to their old ways…and most importantly, the real reason why I was assigned here, making sure that the plague dog equipment stays in reserve. We do not want that to be pulled out and used, ever. Honestly, we're swamped out here. I do not have the manpower to keep an eye on every engineer who is educated here, especially not when they are following the paths, we want them too."

"Looking to rediscover the secrets of the Code Red is a path we want them to follow?"

"Yes, because they don't have the equipment or engineering data to actually do it." Max looked every bit the light of mankind team leader he had been in his younger days as he said that. "What Collin Wallis came up with was a monkey model work around, one that was known and discarded in by Star League scientists as inefficient and too limited to be worth pursuing. The alloy created is known to us, as are its limits."

"I trust that this Wallis will not be repeating his success?"

"He had an unfortunate encounter with a drunk driver more then a year ago." Max replied mildly, his slight grin the only indication of his satisfaction with a job well done.

"And the rotary autocannons which were based off his work?"

"His widow followed in his footsteps in finding work arounds." Max shrugged as he admitted that. "She combined his work with brute force to achieve the desired result, albeit in an inferior manner. It's a technological dead end, but one that can be pursued for decades before anyone realizes that, diverting research funding from more dangerous avenues."

"Are there more dangerous avenues available to them?"

"Yes." Max answered flatly. "As I said the core forges are a myth, but given enough time they might be able to monkey model something approaching one, giving them access to a true yard instead of the limited refit and repair capabilities that they have at the moment. Industrial tooling is another area of concern, as they kept at least some records of what they had before Corean received the go ahead from Michael Davion to begin repossession proceedings."

The two men shared a satisfied smile at that assertion. The truth of the matter was that the Brockton industrial base had never reached New Avalon, despite what the executives at Corean thought. It had been diverted and replaced by ROM while in transit. Rim World manufactured tooling was less efficient, effective, and designed to be operated and serviced by an undereducated population, therefore it was much easier to reproduce, repair, and lacked the black boxing which came standard with proper Hegemony equipment. Between Kerensky's efforts, and the early efforts of ROM operating with the remaining hegemony intelligence officers, most Rim World tooling had successfully been dealt with. Brockton, by virtue of the Brockton families' efforts to save their own skins, had been a glaring exception to that success. Fortunately, Michael Davion and Corean had given ComStar a chance to correct that mistake.

"Beyond those problems I also need to keep an eye on what the Brockton family is up to. They are far too adaptable for me to be completely comfortable that I truly have the measure of what's going on here. Their stunt with Jalastar came out of left field, and while their opportunism is something that we can use their ability to think in the long term is a continuing worry."

"Would it be prudent to think about allowing the family to meet its natural end?" Huthrin enquired, his voice mild. "The Allison precedent comes to mind…"

Max opened his mouth to reply with a snap judgement and then stopped himself. Despite what he thought about ComStars continuing fumbles in the free world's league this wasn't the time or the place for him to voice his concerns. The truth was the leagues chaotic natural tendencies had rendered every effort by Comstar to formulate a coherent policy into a schizophrenic mess. Something that was best exemplified by the fact that ROM assets had been brought in to rebuild portions of their industrial base after ROM had been tasked with wrecking it. Fortunately, they were operating under the auspices of a successionist minded province, but it was still a farcical situation. Actually, that brought to mind a possible suggestion, the Andurien precedent might not be amiss here.

"I'm not comfortable with the next in line on world and any off world noble family…"

"There is that." Huthrin grimaced. He was just as aware as Max was of how the new nobility operated. Without centuries of legitimacy behind them they tended to need works to prop themselves up. On border worlds that was easily controllable, a few subtle nudges and they would channel their energies into military adventurism. Brockton very much wasn't a border world, and raids out there would be obvious, so any new noble would turn to either trade, or industrial development to make their mark.

"Better to see if we can pull a Humphreys on them."

"Difficult, the suns doesn't work like the league does…" though ostentatiously against the idea Huthrin sounded intrigued.

"Brockton is already ignored by New Avalon, despite their achievements. With suitable prompting a wedge is natural…" Max grinned as he said that. "They are already supporting the CrMM well beyond what New Avalon denies to send."

"Keep working on developing that idea. It's impractical for the moment, due to the attention they just garnered, but long term it might very well be the answer we have been looking for. Speaking of attention, your job is about to get a lot harder. Hanse Davion is moving the second Chisholm Rangers on world, and they're bringing a heavy intelligence section with them. Keep your operatives under control, we don't have the usual deniability out there." Huthrin ordered. "I trust that there will be no further developments out of the blue?"

"I have already impressed on my ROM section that very idea." Max nodded in agreement. "Precentor Ilian's sudden passing seems to have motivated them sufficiently."

"Do express my condolences to his subordinates," Huthrin was perfectly comfortable mouthing that platitude. There were times when failures had to have consequences, and it seemed Max understood that well. After all he had arraigned for the lead ROM agent's passing personally. "It sounds like you have the situation as in hand as it can be, should that change…" Needless to say Huthrin didn't feel the need to finish his threat. Max understood him very well.

 

[GSpectre]

December 9th​ 3015
Outside of Helio
Heligoland, Capellan Confederation

Harry Brockton tried to find the bright side of the raid he was on. He should have been in command, unfortunately his actions had precluded that. The mechwarriors who made up his command would have mutinied if he had retained command after mouthing off like he had to the first prince. They were all from the lower nobility of the outback, and to them the first prince was a check on their local planetary dukes. Harry had inadvertently stumbled into a political mine field; his social rank made his gaffe worse. With one action he had gone from a respected retired heavy guard's captain, one who had generously volunteered to take the most problematic of the experimental refits, to a typical example of the upper nobility.

In theory Harry could have retained command, but he wasn't a fool. The pilots would have second guessed his every move, making actually commanding into an exercise in futility which had a high probability of getting them all killed. Especially given that they had a depth of experience that matched or surpassed his own. With that in mind he had dumped command onto the Davion liaison, letting Major Janet Olsen command. As a retired member of the armored cavalry, she was honestly the better choice, having spent her time in service working with primarily medium weight mechs, and she had rank on Harry. It was a sidestep of the issues he had created, but workable for the moment.

Janet's experience with this type of operation was vast and it showed in her planning. Her well weathered face, greying hair, and solidity had been a comfort as they jumped their way towards their target, she had made herself into a familiar face on the Lion class Deliverance getting to know everyone, even going so far as to spend time with the techs. That had allowed her to build a level of trust with everyone involved, something that Harry had tried to do before. Additionally, she had a deep knowledge of their operations area, Harry wouldn't have thought about using the limited water supply of Helio to his advantage but she had. There was a single reservoir which served the entire city, and Janet had seen the opportunity to draw out the Kingston Legionnaires by attacking one of the pumping stations which served the main citizens residential areas. Given the screen of light mechs they were pushing against, it seemed to be working.

Janet's personality had allowed her to set the lances without anyone getting bent out of shape, even if they weren't anywhere near what Harry himself would have done. She had kept the two mechs with the heavier RACs together, grouping them with her CRD-3D Crusader and the experimental MML Whitworth, due to their lack of long-range firepower. The remaining two Swordsmen had been grouped with the Shadow Hawks to form the second lance. That had been a decision made back on New Avalon, when they had decided which machines to bring with them. The 2DX1 Shad had been left behind along with the X1 Swordsman, the Shad because of the simple nature of its modifications showed a clear upgrade path for the 2H Shadow Hawks in service and the X1 because the Swordsman wasn't popular enough to justify such a simple upgrade. Besides the coveted 2D2 Shad designation would go to one of the more comprehensive upgrades, while the original 2D configuration would probably be retired in favor of the 2DX1 as it had more short-range firepower while retaining the armor of a 2H, solving the long running issue of the original 2D.

"Looks like the legionnaires are committing, 2-2 on me, we have the Clint then move on to the stingers. 2-3 and 2-4, looks like the locust is going to try for a fast pass, make sure that doesn't happen. Raid one, you know what to do…" Janet's orders broke Harry's train of thought and he concentrated on the charging Liao mechs. The Clint was hanging back, clearly intending to provide covering fire, while the Stingers were charging in behind the Locust. If he didn't miss his guess they intended to dance in middle range as a distraction while the Locust got all the sensor data it could. Janet held back, letting the Liao mechs close, until they were all firmly into the middle range band of an LRM system. She let the Clint get in the first shot, its autocannon chip away at the thick armor of her Crusaders chest in order to have a better firing solution.

Harry could respect that, but he didn't have time to really follow what anyone else was doing. Switching his own temperamental autocannon into four shot mode he tracked the Locust and then opened fire as soon as it entered medium laser range. Only three shots rang out, before a warning buzzed in his cockpit as the RAC jammed. Raid 2-3 in his Swordsman despite having the same weapon lacked his issues. The over the shoulder configuration gave the large weapon a more stable rest and so was less prone to jamming. He fired off six shots, although only four hit, but combined with the one Harry managed to land it was enough to finish off the charging light mech.

Cursing as he hit the button which would spin the autocannon and clear its jam Harry swung around to target the Stinger on the left. He noted that the Clint was already in retreat. Its light armor was compromised due to the number of LRMs which had rained down on it. The Liao officer, smartly in his opinion, chose to retreat before the two mechs targeting him could start breaking the expensive and hard to replace internals of his mech. That left the Stingers on their own, facing four mechs which carried enough firepower individually to out fight the pair.

Say what you would about the Liao's, and Harry could say a lot about the slaving bastards, their citizen warriors didn't lack for courage. The two Stingers didn't pause for an instant before charging in, they knew they were doomed but clearly intended to do at least a little damage before they went down. Unfortunately for them they were severely out matched. 2-3 kept his autocannon going at full bore, landing shots from the left shoulder of his intended target all the way across its chest to the other shoulder, causing the smaller mechs gyro to over compensate and the Liao mech jock to lose control. The other Stinger was slightly better off, as the LRM salvos which hit it were less concentrated, with the majority of the missiles being decoyed off by its basic ECM. It charged out of the smoke and thrown up dirt just as Harry's autocannon finished unjamming.

Ignoring the downed Stinger, even as it got back to its feet, Harry setting his crosshairs on the smaller mechs torso and fired his second shot of the engagement. This time his Autocannon worked, although only two of the shots impacted. Harry's aim had been off, although he shouldn't complain too much. The shells tore into the right shoulder of the smaller machine, tearing off its main weapon, even as the other two shots drifted wide. 2-2's LRMs came in at the same time, one flight haring off after the sun while the other impacted on the Stingers left hip, causing it to lock up and the smaller mech to plow into the soft earth of the field they were fighting in. Harry was tempted to finish off the smaller machine, but restrained himself.

"2-2, you have the honor," Harry put out over the radio while turning his own mech towards the brewing battle to his left. While his own lance had been annihilating the light mechs sent after them the legionnaires mediums had started a long-range sparing match with Raid one. That would be a problem, as the Liao mechs were set up for that sort of long-range sparing match. A pair of Vindicators backing up a Marik Wolverine, with a lone Panther hanging out in the back field, made for a formidable lance. They had a lot of long-range firepower, and were using it well. LRMs, PPC bolts, and Autocannon shells were crisscrossing the field between the two lances, and the Liao's were already getting the better of the exchange.

Raid one was concentrating fire on one of the Vindicators, clearly hoping to take it out of the fight quickly, while the Legionnaires were spreading their fire between the two Shads. Harry brought his mech up to a run, intending to make the Kurita built Panther concentrate on him rather then giving its lance mates fire support. Before he could get close enough to do so a second medium lance entered the fray, forcing him to pull up short and redirect his mech. They weren't in weapons range yet, but if Harry had kept on his original target, he would have been so far ahead of his lance mates as to present a prime target for focused fire. Given the relatively light armor scheme of the Icarus II he was currently riding? That would have been a disaster.

Once again Harry wished he was still riding his Thunderbolt, rather then the mech he was in. If he had been then he would have felt comfortable in keeping his course and tanking any shots he took, confident that his armor would hold long enough for the rest of his lance to get involved. As it stood, he started to pull back, bringing his mech into line with the rest of his lance as they turned to face the emerging threat.

"Keep the range open, we don't want to get into a slugging match with a Hunchback, concentrate fire on the Enforcer," Janet swiftly ordered. Harry had to respect her reaction, it was decisive and showed her experience, but he questioned if the orders she had given were the correct ones. He personally would have thought that the Quickdraw was the larger threat then the Enforcer, it was the heavier machine after all. Then again, aside from its ten pack of LRMs it was designed to fight at short range, and it had the speed to dictate the range. "Once they close 2-3 and 2-4 on the draw, take him down quick, 2-2 the Shad."

Harry reached down and adjusted his autocannons settings, going for single shots rather then burst fire. Having jammed up his cannon once in this engagement he wanted to be sure it would work, better to sacrifice firepower at range for the chance to let rip once the Quickdraw closed in rather then being forced to clear a jam due to being over eager at range. Drifting his targeting reticule over to the broad chest of the Enforcer he waited for it to come into range.

Long range missiles flashed out, trailing smoke across the field between the two advancing lances of titanic war machines, with Harrys own lance producing the majority of the shots. The Liao mechs weren't configured for this kind of long-range slugging match and it showed, as they only returned about a quarter of the missiles. To Harry's experienced eye it looked like the Liao's were having maintenance issues with the Enforcer, its native ECM wasn't nearly as effective as it should have been perhaps it had been replaced with parts meant for a militia mech, meaning most of the LRMs impacted on the tough mech. No matter what Harry thought of the Liao's maintenance issues the pilot was good, despite losing more than a ton of armor he kept his feet and closed the range, gamely trying to get into range of his own weapons.

The Liao mechs return fire was much less effective, but they concentrated well. Clearly, they had decided that Janet's mech was the largest threat, and they further chipped away at her armor as they closed the range. The two faster mechs broke from their slower companions, in a bid to disrupt what Harry and the rest of the lance had planned, but he thought he would get at least one shot at the Enforcer before he had to shift targets. That supposition turned out to be wrong, and he had to throw his aim around as the Quickdraw was faster than he had thought. The Legionnaires might be green, but they knew their business well enough to see a losing proposition and react to it. The Quickdraw driver had over ridden his computer and put it into sprint mode, forcing Harry to shift his target and react before he was really ready.

Due to his target fixation Harry didn't think to change his autocannon settings, meaning he only got off a single shot at the charging heavy mech. 2-3, who had much more confidence in his cannon, got off four shots, drawing the attention of the Quickdraw to his own machine. While the rest of the Liao mechs which had the range kept on Janet's Crusader, the Quickdraw altered course to swing into the smaller Swordsman. Cursing himself as an idiot, Harry switched his cannon into four shot burst mode, even as he moved laterally to get the advancing heavy into a crossfire with 2-3. Keeping an eye on the Shadow Hawk, which was still slightly behind, he let rip with his cannon. The Quickdraw driver seemed to come up short in surprise for an instant, before continuing on his course towards the Swordsman. 2-3 continued to make himself into the larger threat, having gone full bore with his own cannon, trusting the better mounting to keep him jam free.

As he repositioned a flight of fire missiles roared over his head, causing Harry to instinctively duck just in time to move his torso into a blast of autocannon fire from the Shadow Hawk. Seeing that the Shad was about to eat a flight of missiles from 2-2s Whitworth Harry kept his eye on the prize, sending out another salvo at the rapidly closing heavy mech he had in his sites. Half of his shots went wide, his sudden movement having thrown off his aim, and Harry quickly readjusted, he almost changed his cannons settings but the closing range changed his mind. He would have to deal with a bit of heat, but at this range it was time for him to bring his lasers into play.

They were on the edge of their range, but better to bring them into play now that the Quickdraws own arsenal was in range. He wasn't the only one to think that way, as 2-3 opened up with everything he had. Explosions wracked the Quickdraw, but from what Harry's sensors were telling him they hadn't gotten through its armor. With a frown he switched his cannon to its maximum, preparing to cover for the now sluggishly moving 2-3. The Quickdraw driver could tell that the Swordsman was carrying a bit more heat then was advisable, and moved to take advantage of that. Unfortunately for him that put him squarely in Harry's sites, at just outside of optimal range.

The Swordsman took to the air, 2-3 was using his jets to compensate for his stress mymomers, and putting a trio of auto cannon shots into the advancing heavy. Despite his best efforts his mech was wreathed with explosions as he caught most of the heavy mechs return fire, Harry couldn't help but wince at that. The Swordsman was just as lightly armored as his own Icarus, and it couldn't take more then another salvo like that before he was in trouble. Fortunately, he didn't have to, Harry's own alpha strike went in almost perfectly, concentrated on the right side of the heavy his shots broke past the armor and struck deep, evidently catching at least a part of the SRM ammo stored there. The heavy machine came apart, o rings flying everywhere, even as Harry swung himself around to take a look at the rest of the fight. Between the high heat load he was carrying, making his mechs responses sluggish, and the fact his autocannon had jammed yet again he had very little to contribute.

Janet had clearly gotten the better of the Enforcer, it was withdrawing missing an arm. The Hunchback was trying to cover it, but its lack of long-range weapons was telling, not that it really needed to be more than a shield. Janet had shifted her target to the Shadow Hawk, combining her fire with 2-2's in order to give that mech a very bad day. Harry started moving towards the retreating mechs, but his autocannon failed to clear its jam, and so he slowed his mech in the hopes that a smoother ride would allow him to clear the jam without further issues. 2-3, despite the armor damage he had taken, wasn't having the trouble Harry was. He had shed most of his heat and joined the others of the lance in pounding on the Shad. Faced with three to one odds, an unbelievable number of SRMs cratering his armor, and now the heavy autocannon fire that the Swordman could generate, the Liao mech warrior in the Shad choose the better part of valor and punched out.

2-2 and 2-3 ignored the ejection seat, but concentrated their laser fire on the downed machine, punching through the depleted armor and eviscerating the hulk as they hit the SRM ammo.

"2-2, 2-3, enough." Janet sounded annoyed at their actions, which Harry could understand. She was used to dealing with regulars on both sides of her engagements. The pilots Harry had brought with him came straight out of the CrMM which served the outback, there opponents tended to be pirates, and so making sure that a Mech wasn't useable if you weren't sure, you would control the field after an engagement was standard practice. Better to destroy an irreplaceable machine then to have the pirates recover it and use it against you later, at least that was their thinking.

"We're facing regulars here, not the usual scum of the sphere," Harry broke in before Janet could start berating the mech jocks for their unchivalrous conduct. "They might be slave taking bastards just like the scum you usually fight, but they are regulars and need to be treated as such."

"Roger."

"Shift fire," Janet quickly took back control. "Raid ones in trouble, lets bail them out."

She wasn't kidding. Harry, when he actually took a look at raid one, was surprised to see just how battered they were. Both of the Shadow Hawks were falling back, missing arms and with armor that was more a suggestion then a fact. The Swordsmen were covering them, but they were getting battered by the Vindicators and the Panther. It looked like the only part of that battle that had gone the Davion's way was the downed form of the Wolverine. Harry couldn't tell if it was truly knocked out or if it was playing dead, his assumption was that it had gotten close enough to for the obscene number of SRMs the MMLs of raid one made possible to come into play.

It seemed that the Liao officer controlling the lance which had been battering raid one hadn't been in the Wolverine, as they started to pull back as soon as raid two began their own advance. Janet kept their speed down, letting the Liao mechs go, wary of any additional mechs that the Legionnaires could bring into play. The legionnaires had two Liao style battalions on world according to DMI, so they had the numbers to smother this raid should they choose too. Once she was certain that the Liao mechs really were in retreat Janet began pulling back as well, using her less damaged lance to cover the withdrawal of raid one. Undoubtedly the Legionnaires would consider this a victory, having driven off a Davion raid, but Harry, and evidently Janet as well, was satisfied that they had proven his point. The two-lance raid force had destroyed the better part of a company of enemy machines for no permanent losses of their own. In his mind that meant his point had been proven. Before Harry could wander further down that mental blind ally his com system chimed with a laser link request. Slightly surprised he accepted it.

"What the hell was that," Janet sounded heartily annoyed. "I thought you brought professionals, and hitting a downed mech? That is not professional."

"They are professional's, the best pilots we could get our hands on," Harry defended. "The problem is we're all from the outback, and things are different out there."

"I looked at your service record kid," Janet wasn't giving an inch on this he could tell. "You never did anything that bone headed in a fight. Off duty? Sure."

"I had the opportunity to go to Goshen, and then went directly to the Heavy Guards right out of school." Harry thought about how to phrase his argument. "Most of the mech jocks I brought with me, they're family trained. The two who went to an academy? Point Barrow. Then they served with the local march militia."

"I started my career with the march militia, and was family trained before I won a spot at Sac. Don't bullshit me."

"Not in the outback," Harry quickly sought to clarify. "Out there what they did is standard procedure. You can't afford to let the enemy recover a mech, because inside of a couple of months its going to be back doing all the standard pirate things. Given the support we get out of New Avalon… it's a compromise. You know just as well as I do just how far the march militias are stretched in that direction."

"Christ…" Janet paused, thinking if Harry had to make a guess. "It's that bad?"

"Forty percent of the mechs are militia grade, even with my family and the other nobles of the region chipping in where they can." Harry drew on every political bone on his body as he continued, hoping to sell what he was saying and not fuck up further then he already had. "We understand. Between the Capellans on one border, and their love for slave taking, and the Dracs on the other with their predilection for war crimes, someone has to get the short end of the stick. So, training and customs have developed a little differently to compensate."

"That's part of why you are so hung up on Corean, isn't it…" Janet's voice lacked an accusatory tone. "And why you're pressing so hard to get the Swordsman accepted into service."

"Yeah, the Swordsman's cheap, barely more expensive than a bug mech, and relatively easy to produce. Couple that with its utility?"

"Save the sales pitch, you already sold me on them." Janet laughed lightly. "I wouldn't have thought it when I took this assignment but, you were right."

 

[GSpectre]

This isn't a propper TRO style update, but here are the Mech Stats for the raid force:

Raid Lance 1

Spoiler: SHD-2d-x1

Mass: 55 tons
Chassis: Earthwerks SHD
Power Plant: Coretek 275
Cruising Speed: 54 kph
Maximum Speed: 86.4 kph
Armor: Maximillian 43
Armament:
1 Light AC/5
2 Medium Laser
1 MML 9
Communication System: O/P 300 COMSET
Targeting & Tracking System: O/P 2000A
Introduction Year: 3145
Tech Rating/Availability: D/X-X-X-D
Cost: 4,769,557 C-bills

Type: SHD-2D-X1 Shadowhawk
Technology Base: Inner Sphere (Standard)
Tonnage: 55
Battle Value: 1,178

Equipment		Mass
Internal Structure		5.5
Engine	275 Fusion	15.5
Walking MP:	5
Running MP:	8
Jumping MP:	3
Heat Sink:	11	1
Gyro:		3
Cockpit:		3
Armor Factor:	152	9.5

	Internal Structure	Armor Value
Head	3	9
Center Torso	18	22
Center Torso (rear)		7
R/L Torso	13	17
R/L Torso (rear)		5
R/L Arm	9	14
R/L Leg	13	21

Weapons and Ammo	Location	Critical	Tonnage
Jump Jet	CT	1	0.5
MML 9	RT	5	6
MML 9 SRM Ammo (11)	RT	1	1
Jump Jet	RT	1	0.5
MML 9 LRM Ammo (13)	RT	1	1
Medium Laser	LA	1	1
Light AC/5	LT	2	5
LAC/5 Ammo (20)	LT	1	1
Jump Jet	LT	1	0.5
Medium Laser	RA	1	1

Spoiler: SHD-2H-X2

Mass: 55 tons
Chassis: Earthwerks SHD
Power Plant: Coretek 275
Cruising Speed: 54 kph
Maximum Speed: 86.4 kph
Armor: Maximillian 43
Armament:
1 MML 5
1 Medium Laser
1 Rotary AC/2
Communication System: O/P 300 COMSET
Targeting & Tracking System: O/P 2000A
Introduction Year: 3145
Tech Rating/Availability: E/X-X-X-D
Cost: 4,670,357 C-bills

Type: SHD-2H-X1 Shadowhawk
Technology Base: Inner Sphere (Standard)
Tonnage: 55
Battle Value: 1,128

Equipment		Mass
Internal Structure		5.5
Engine	275 Fusion	15.5
Walking MP:	5
Running MP:	8
Jumping MP:	3
Heat Sink:	11	1
Gyro:		3
Cockpit:		3
Armor Factor:	152	9.5

	Internal Structure	Armor Value
Head	3	9
Center Torso	18	22
Center Torso (rear)		7
R/L Torso	13	17
R/L Torso (rear)		5
R/L Arm	9	14
R/L Leg	13	21

Weapons and Ammo	Location	Critical	Tonnage
Jump Jet	CT	1	0.5
MML 5 SRM Ammo (20)	RT	1	1
MML 5	RT	3	3
MML 5 LRM Ammo (24)	RT	1	1
Jump Jet	RT	1	0.5
Rotary AC/2 Ammo (90)	LT	2	2
Rotary AC/2	LT	3	8
Jump Jet	LT	1	0.5
Medium Laser	RA	1	1

Spoiler: SWD-2D-X1

Mass: 40 tons
Chassis: Jerrico Type II
Power Plant: LTV 160
Cruising Speed: 43.2 kph
Maximum Speed: 64.8 kph
Armor: Durallex Light
Armament:
1 MML 5
2 Medium Laser
1 Rotary AC/2
Manufacturer: Trevlu Mechworks
Primary Factory: Brockton
Communication System: Achernar Electronics HICK-3
Targeting & Tracking System: Federated Gatherer
Introduction Year: 3145
Tech Rating/Availability: E/X-X-X-D
Cost: 2,760,893 C-bills

Type: SWD-2 -X1 Swordsman
Technology Base: Inner Sphere (Standard)
Tonnage: 40
Battle Value: 834

Equipment		Mass
Internal Structure		4
Engine	160 Fusion	6
Walking MP:	4
Running MP:	6
Jumping MP:	0
Heat Sink:	10	0
Gyro:		2
Cockpit:		3
Armor Factor:	128	8

	Internal Structure	Armor Value
Head	3	9
Center Torso	12	18
Center Torso (rear)		5
R/L Torso	10	15
R/L Torso (rear)		4
R/L Arm	6	11
R/L Leg	10	18

Weapons and Ammo	Location	Critical	Tonnage
MML 5 SRM Ammo (20)	RT	1	1
MML 5	RT	3	3
MML 5 LRM Ammo (24)	RT	1	1
2 Heat Sinks	RT	2	2
Medium Laser	LA	1	1
Rotary AC/2 Ammo (90)	LT	2	2
Rotary AC/2	LT	3	8
2 Heat Sinks	LT	2	2
Medium Laser	RA	1	1

Spoiler: SWD-2D-X2

Mass: 40 tons
Chassis: Jerrico Type II
Power Plant: LTV 160
Cruising Speed: 43.2 kph
Maximum Speed: 64.8 kph
Armor: Durallex Light
Armament:
1 Light AC/5
1 MML 7
2 Medium Laser
Manufacturer: Trevlu Mechworks
Primary Factory: Brockton
Communication System: Achernar Electronics HICK-3
Targeting & Tracking System: Federated Gatherer
Introduction Year: 3145
Tech Rating/Availability: D/X-X-X-D
Cost: 2,952,693 C-bills

Type: SWD-2 -X2 Swordsman
Technology Base: Inner Sphere (Standard)
Tonnage: 40
Battle Value: 889

Equipment		Mass
Internal Structure		4
Engine	160 Fusion	6
Walking MP:	4
Running MP:	6
Jumping MP:	4
Heat Sink:	10	0
Gyro:		2
Cockpit:		3
Armor Factor:	136	8.5

	Internal Structure	Armor Value
Head	3	9
Center Torso	12	18
Center Torso (rear)		5
R/L Torso	10	16
R/L Torso (rear)		4
R/L Arm	6	12
R/L Leg	10	20

Weapons and Ammo	Location	Critical	Tonnage
MML 7	RT	4	4.5
MML 7 SRM Ammo (14)	RT	1	1
MML 7 LRM Ammo (17)	RT	1	1
2 Jump Jets	RT	2	1
2 Heat Sinks	RT	2	2
Medium Laser	LA	1	1
Light AC/5	LT	2	5
LAC/5 Ammo (20)	LT	1	1
2 Jump Jets	LT	2	1
2 Heat Sinks	LT	2	2
Medium Laser	RA	1	1

Raid Lance 2

Spoiler: WTH-1-X1

Mass: 40 tons
Chassis: Jerrico Type II
Power Plant: LTV 160
Cruising Speed: 43.2 kph
Maximum Speed: 64.8 kph
Armor: Durallex Light
Armament:
2 MML 7
2 Medium Laser
Manufacturer: Trevlu Mechworks
Primary Factory: Brockton
Communication System: Achernar Electronics HICK-3
Targeting & Tracking System: Federated Gatherer
Introduction Year: 3145
Tech Rating/Availability: D/X-X-X-D
Cost: 2,931,693 C-bills

Type: WTH -1-X1 Whitworth
Technology Base: Inner Sphere (Standard)
Tonnage: 40
Battle Value: 899

Equipment		Mass
Internal Structure		4
Engine	160 Fusion	6
Walking MP:	4
Running MP:	6
Jumping MP:	4
Heat Sink:	10	0
Gyro:		2
Cockpit:		3
Armor Factor:	137	9

	Internal Structure	Armor Value
Head	3	9
Center Torso	12	18
Center Torso (rear)		6
R/L Torso	10	15
R/L Torso (rear)		5
R/L Arm	6	12
R/L Leg	10	20

Weapons and Ammo	Location	Critical	Tonnage
MML 7 SRM Ammo (14)	CT	1	1
MML 7	RT	4	4.5
MML 7 LRM Ammo (17)	RT	1	1
2 Jump Jets	RT	2	1
2 Heat Sinks	RT	2	2
Medium Laser	LA	1	1
MML 7	LT	4	4.5
MML 7 LRM Ammo (17)	LT	1	1
2 Jump Jets	LT	2	1
2 Heat Sinks	LT	2	2
Medium Laser	RA	1	1

Spoiler: SWD-2D-X3

Mass: 40 tons
Chassis: Jerrico Type II
Power Plant: LTV 160
Cruising Speed: 43.2 kph
Maximum Speed: 64.8 kph
Armor: Durallex Light
Armament:
2 Medium Laser
1 Rotary AC/5
Manufacturer: Trevlu Mechworks
Primary Factory: Brockton
Communication System: Achernar Electronics HICK-3
Targeting & Tracking System: Federated Gatherer
Introduction Year: 3145
Tech Rating/Availability: E/X-X-X-D
Cost: 2,937,293 C-bills

Type: SWD-2 -X3 Swordsman
Technology Base: Inner Sphere (Standard)
Tonnage: 40
Battle Value: 1,121

Equipment		Mass
Internal Structure		4
Engine	160 Fusion	6
Walking MP:	4
Running MP:	6
Jumping MP:	4
Heat Sink:	10	0
Gyro:		2
Cockpit:		3
Armor Factor:	128	8

	Internal Structure	Armor Value
Head	3	9
Center Torso	12	18
Center Torso (rear)		5
R/L Torso	10	15
R/L Torso (rear)		4
R/L Arm	6	11
R/L Leg	10	18

Weapons and Ammo	Location	Critical	Tonnage
Rotary AC/5 Ammo (20)	CT	1	1
2 Jump Jets	RT	2	1
2 Heat Sinks	RT	2	2
Medium Laser	LA	1	1
Rotary AC/5	LT	6	10
Rotary AC/5 Ammo (40)	LT	2	2
2 Jump Jets	LT	2	1
2 Heat Sinks	LT	2	2
Medium Laser	RA	1	1

Spoiler: ICR-1S-X1 Icarus II

Mass: 40 tons
Chassis: Jerrico Type II
Power Plant: LTV 160
Cruising Speed: 43.2 kph
Maximum Speed: 64.8 kph
Armor: Durallex Light
Armament:
2 Medium Laser
1 Rotary AC/5
Manufacturer: Trevlu Mechworks
Primary Factory: Brockton
Communication System: Achernar Electronics HICK-3
Targeting & Tracking System: Federated Gatherer
Introduction Year: 3145
Tech Rating/Availability: E/X-X-X-D
Cost: 2,932,813 C-bills

Type: ICR-1S-X1 Icarus II
Technology Base: Inner Sphere (Standard)
Tonnage: 40
Battle Value: 1,121

Equipment		Mass
Internal Structure		4
Engine	160 Fusion	6
Walking MP:	4
Running MP:	6
Jumping MP:	4
Heat Sink:	10	0
Gyro:		2
Cockpit:		3
Armor Factor:	128	8

	Internal Structure	Armor Value
Head	3	9
Center Torso	12	18
Center Torso (rear)		5
R/L Torso	10	15
R/L Torso (rear)		4
R/L Arm	6	11
R/L Leg	10	18

Weapons and Ammo	Location	Critical	Tonnage
2 Jump Jets	LL	2	1
2 Medium Lasers	RT	2	2
2 Heat Sinks	RT	2	2
Rotary AC/5	LA	6	10
Rotary AC/5 Ammo (60)	LT	3	3
2 Heat Sinks	LT	2	2
2 Jump Jets	RL	2	1

 

[GSpectre]

March 12th​ 3016
GalaPort
Galatea, Lyran Commonwealth

With Janet off to collect her new charges, a group of doctors who were playing at being a mercenary unit the First Prince wanted badly on his payroll, Harry had been left somewhat at loose ends. His original plan to continue on to Solaris with examples of the light and rotary autocannons in the hold of a civilian liner having been put on hold due to a message from home. He was supposed to keep his Icarus II as a demonstrator while sending everyone else back home and wait for a rep to back him up during his negotiations with the Lyran businessmen he was scheduled to meet. During the journey here his time had been taken up by repairing the damage that the mechs had taken in their brief combat debut. Mostly fixing armor plating, but he and the rest of the techs had a devil of a time getting the Shadow Hawks arms back on. The Kingston Legionnaires had been a bit too accurate with their PPC fire and had wrecked the joints as well as amputating the arms.

Despite his best efforts he had failed to click with any of the other mech jocks. He was regarded as too much the over educated new Avalon fuckhead for them to accept him, although he did get some respect for his skills in a mech. Helping out with the techs hadn't done a damn thing to correct the other pilots first impressions of him, or help him clean up after his spectacular screw up in front of the First Prince. The other pilots might be regarded as march militia scum by others, but they held to their oaths all the harder because of that scorn. Harry had committed a cardinal sin in their eyes, performing les majesty, and even if they agreed with his opinion, they couldn't be seen agreeing with him because of that.

Harry had been grateful for the work that the techs had provided him, it kept him from stewing on his mistakes, and worrying about just who his father had dispatched to be his minder. He wasn't looking forward to that, especially the tongue lashing he was sure was coming. His parents, and their business partners, had trusted him enough to assign him a point position in the upcoming negotiations and he had thrown that trust away in a drunken fit. With the mechs work gone he had gone looking for more work to distract himself, thus neatly explaining what he was doing sitting on the shoulders of his Icarus II after having repainted the head again. Fortunately, his small staff had found a working bay to store the mech in while they all waited, mostly Harry thought to get him out of their hair.

"Moping again? I swear you boys. I didn't have nearly as much trouble with the girls," Brenda Brockton said from behind Harry, making him start.

"Mom!" Harry couldn't help the plaintive note which entered his voice as he kept himself from slipping off his perch and plunging to the unforgiving ferro crete many meters below.

"Still seeking out high points to mope at I see."

"I was fixing the paint job," Harry tried to retain some of his dignity. He was well aware that it was a futile effort, but he tried anyway. Surprisingly his mother joined him at his perch, rather than pulling him back into the inactive bay.

"A good use of your time, I guess. Still, things have gotten complicated." Harry noted that his mother was frowning.

"Beyond my screw up on New Avalon?"

"Well beyond that," Harry noted just how his mother's nose tightened in annoyance. "You damn near derailed Clara's husbands' career with that stunt Harry. What were you thinking! I know I taught you better than that."

"It was supposed to be a low-key mixer, no higher nobility involved, so I thought I could relax for a bit…" Harry admitted. "We had just finished the first of the test runs, and turned over the prototypes to the AFFS evaluators. Nothing was announced yet so there was no reason for the First Prince to be there, I'd pulled security for dozens of those types of mixers and none of the upper-level nobles ever attended."

"Most of your service was under Ian, who hardly ever was on New Avalon. Hanse is a very different man, much more hands on politically, but I suppose I can understand what you were thinking. Still, try to keep your head about in the future? For me at least." Brenda found that Harry's explanation was actually understandable. He had evaluated the situation based on his past experience like she had taught him and come to a conclusion. It had been incorrect, but there had actually been some thought to his actions. Letting off some steam in a lower pressure environment before he headed to a place where he would need to be on his guard twenty-four eight was understandable. "Still things are worse than you know."

"Alright, hit me with it." Harry frowned at the nerves his unflappable mother was displaying.

"There are questions being asked back home about when you are going to settle down and get married." Brenda put it bluntly. "Between Hanse Davion's mourning, and your complete failure to date while you were off with the Guards…"

"That's not completely accurate," Harry started to object.

"Did you bring anyone home? No? Then you don't have room to talk. Your sisters at least would bring their current boyfriends home every now and again."

"Clara went to school on Brockton, and Mindy is a jump ship captain with Brockton on her regular route." Harry's voice was defensive. "It's a little bit different from being stationed across the realm."

"It's the optics of it Harry," Brenda couldn't help but sigh as she said that. "People are worried that you're going to remain a bachelor forever, like the first prince, and then Hasek is going to put one of his cronies in charge."

"Why would they worry about that?" Harry asked in confusion. "Erics my heir, and even if something happens to him while he's in service Clara has a perfectly respectable husband."

"Your brother is a spoiled brat," Brenda said with a fair amount of venom in her voice. "He went out to party on Point Barrow and was pulled in by the local PB for a moral's violation. Then he refused the families help, but not our lawyer or money, in getting him out of his jam."

"Mina?" Harry asked mildly. The entire family was well aware of Erics preferences, and for the most part didn't care. He was of their blood and they would love him anyway. The rest of the inner sphere? His proclivities could very well end up with Eric dead in a ditch beaten to death no matter what his social rank. Getting him cover so that he wasn't at risk of judicial murder on top of that would have been his mother's highest priority.

"Mina, an internship under Theresa, and a private home he could entertain who he liked in. Naturally Mina was a bridge too far for your brother, no matter how it would affect the rest of the family. Thank God your sisters are already married, although I suppose our wedding gift to Clara's husband didn't help the rumors."

"Mom, you and dad gave him an assault mech. Of course, people were going to talk."

"We needed to indicate our approval of the match," Brenda sniffed in distain. "Some of the other Dukes were beginning to talk, not realizing that the young man was headed to New Avalon to take up a highly placed position in the ministry of agriculture. Who cared if he was a commoner. Did those cretins not realize just what a catch he was for your sister, and the rest of the family?"

"Assault mech."

"Well yes, we also needed to get it out of the Garg's hanger before uncomfortable questions started being asked." Brenda shrugged lightly. "Strikers aren't the most well regarded but Rogers second oldest was about to head off to Albion. If he didn't send her with it then questions would have been asked."

"Questions like why?"

"Exactly. We really don't want those questions asked, because the logical answer is exactly what we did." Brenda flashed a predatory smirk as she said that. "We're almost ready, but not yet. Anyway, while we mostly suppressed the news of the arrest… rumors got out, which is making our position weaker than is comfortable."

"I thought we had a relatively strong position? We certainly don't have any opposition at home, not real opposition at least. A few nutters who want a republic… but considering just how much time dad and you spend off world being business barons…"

"It's off world we need to worry about. Clara was supposed to be our in to the court, because your father almost has the pieces, he needs in place to finally get back at Corean. Unfortunately, while I agree with you about her husband, he didn't serve. That's disqualifying to the nobles who would be in charge of arbitrating the succession. Eric of course doesn't care about that, it's all about him at the moment."

"He's a teenager, give him time."

"Time is something we do not have." Brenda stated flatly. "Between our passing along of the MML system, and developing new types of autocannons, the crabs are already pulling on our legs. If that boy could just swallow his pride, send off a sample, and accept he was married on paper… we would have one less vulnerability. It's not like he would need to see the girl, it would just be a bit of paper."

"Not to mention it would let dad bank a favor with the Garg family when their famously sapphic inclined niece turned up married and pregnant." Harry agreed mildly.

"Right, which brings us to you and your shopping list. You knew about the MacEnroe Motors data we wanted, along with any machine tooling, from O'Leary…"

"Mountain Wolf is running deep in the red, I thought that an infusion of cash would be enough to get us what we want…"

"Was. Was running deep in the red. The Archon just dumped a shit ton of Kroner into their coffers. It was just announced today."

"They made the jump…" Harry couldn't help the reverence in his voice. For any company, or family, involved in the militia mech market the jump was the holy grail. Going from producing militia mechs to all up Battlemechs was often tried, but never succeeded, until now it seemed. "Shit. We're fucked, aren't we?"

"Not quite that bad… but almost. Defiance isn't going to be willing to help us, at least not with our tooling problems, but we might be able to get the plans for the Sentinel. They did shut down that line."

"We're about to let them revive it," Harry stated grimly. "They aren't going to want to let go of an exclusive. The Garg's have gotten that close?"

"They figured out how to modify Ajeet's plant to put out both types of engines, it runs slow but… they have production." Brenda confirmed. "What we don't have is a product that takes those engines."

"If you slow down the Striker…"

"NO." Brenda glanced over her shoulder to make damn sure that the hatch was still closed. "Starting out of the gate with an assault is just the sort of action which will have mercs showing up at all our plants. Assault mechs are prestige units, and having one be our first fully in house design would look like we're aiming for Corean. They would have to act before we were fully established."

"We do have some production on Brockton," Harry pointed out.

"Which everyone thinks is fueled by purchases in the outworlds."

"Are people idiots? We've barely done any business with them since 2998 when they passed the heritability requirement for seeds into law." Harry scrunched up his brow in confusion. He had never understood just how the Alliance parliament had managed to get that law through. "Before then it made sense to ship our seeds out there and then take our local currency and convert it into engines… but without a product to ship."

"People see what they want to see, and we did it that way for a long time. We kept it up even after we managed to build our own engine and gyro tooling."

"Why don't we spin up those resources and put new lines in all of the factories?" That was something that Harry had never really understood. They could make the tooling, at least as far as he understood it, but they had refrained from putting it into their other factories off world.

"Several reasons, first the last time we did that the entire Tsamma plant was burned to the ground. The lines we built take five times the manpower to run one of our lines as it should. Then you get into our native electronics industry, which with machines we built can only fab chips with a five-to-ten-year lifespan in the quantities needed. Do you need me to go on?" Brenda very carefully didn't mention the engine plant Andrew was setting up on Basantapur, where they could take advantage of the existing electronics lines and trained manpower.

"So, we can sort of do it, but it would ruin our reputation and we'd be spending a lot of money for little gain."

"Exactly. If we can get examples of the tooling, we want…"

"Duplication?"

"That's the idea." Brenda pursed her lips and frowned as she tried to find a delicate way to tell her son. Finally, she gave up and just said it bluntly. "Between your brothers' antics, our precarious position socially, and the big moves that we want to make you're going to need to make a few sacrifices for the family. I know you wanted to find love, but the political realities don't give us the luxury of waiting. It isn't fair, I know, but we need you to do this."

"Positions of power and responsibility given to the nobility are contingent on the nobilities ability to make sacrifices commiserate with the power and responsibility they have been entrusted with." Harry repeated his mother's favorite truism. It was something she had drilled into her children, trying to make them understand her own position. Being the daughter of the Duke of Baxley, she had been sold to his father when she was just sixteen and his father had been pushing thirty. They had made a life together since then, but she never forgot her origins. The DeBrinion family hadn't had anything of value to offer the Brockton's, except for their daughter, while trying to save their world from a famine. That it had worked out only reinforced the truism Brenda had imparted on her children.

"I'm not happy about this, and neither is your father, but one way or the other you are coming home married to someone respectable. If the Doons family has a disreputable cousin…" Brenda trailed off and then shook her head. "Worst comes to worst after an heir is born, we can arraign something to let you get remarried."

"I understand." Harry couldn't help but close his eyes in frustration at the situation.

"Well, given where we are you will be glad to know you don't have to drive the demonstration unit all the time, I brought your mech with me. At the very least that should give you some respectability here in the commonwealth, you know how they are about your mechs weight."

 

[GSpectre]

May 11th​ 3016
Hayward Arena
Solaris VII, Lyran Commonwealth

The clash of mechs that they were here to observe was audible even in the sound proofed suite that they were watching the match from. Harry hadn't wanted to do business here, but Brandon O'Leary had insisted. To some watching the debut of a new heavy mech would have been an honor, but to Harry it felt like O'Leary was rubbing his success in the Brockton delegations face. He had to know they were just as invested as he had been in rebuilding their family mech works, there was no need for him to be this blatant about pointing out he had succeeded while they were still trying.

"An impressive mech," Harry managed to keep his jealousy out of his voice. "It is in production? Not just a prototype?"

"The first lance is already off the production lines." Brandon stated proudly. "We would have debuted two years ago but the Archon had first call on our production. It was one of the deals we struck in order to obtain our tooling."

"Still I would have thought you would put your Merlin into the mercenary market, not entered it into the class four limited matches." Brenda observed, she was less effected by this display then Harry was and her political experience let her hold on to her temper better. "It seems a bit wasteful."

"Advertising." Brandon said sourly. "Much as I think of my work no ones going to accept it as is without proof its as good as I say it is. Putting the Merlin into the games was the fastest way for us to obtain the recognition that we deserve. No matter how well we do in the circuit, especially given we're competing in the limited category, everyone's going to hear about the Merlin and see its better qualities for themselves."

"Have you thought about licensing? Our Basantapur…" Harry began only to be cut off.

"No. Trading some data to Trevlu is possible, especially in regards to a field which Mountain Wolf is looking forward to abandoning in the future, but beyond that I'm not able to help you." Brandon shook his head.

"Not unwilling, unable," Brenda's voice was contemplative.

"You made a lot of enemies back in three thousand when you disrupted the Centurion deal. Lockheed- CBM has a lot of weight, and I'm not willing to go up against them." Brandon stated pleasantly, not showing his true feelings. He was well aware that there could be advantages Mountain Wolf would reap if they partnered with Trevlu, but the political realities constrained him.

"Lockheed still got the data they were after though…" Harry's brow furled in confusion.

"But not everything. They were looking forward to getting an intact line for a minimal investment. Your counter offer meant they needed to buy everything, rather then just moving tooling from the suns. Even with the additional cash that Jalastar ponied up for the missing tooling Lockheed's bottom line had a hole in it that you could drive a dropship through. The board hasn't forgotten or forgiven that, and they're more then willing to go out of their way to inconvenience you. Mountain Wolf might be the apple of the Archons eye now, but we aren't a heavyweight like Lockheed is, and slights are remembered for a long time in this business." Brandon was firm on this point.

"But there will be no problems with the MacEnroe Motors data?"

"Both our lawyers have gone over that deal, and it has the Archons stamp of approval." Brandon grinned as he said that. The Brockton's were going to be reducing his debt to the Archon, for what was in his view data that would be useless in a few years. Given he had succeeded in bring Mountain Wolf back out of the militia market he thought that other companies would be following him, reducing the need or desire for militia grade gear. "It's a done deal, and I don't have any problems with it."

"But no interest expanding on it," Brenda said in understanding.

"It's not that I'm uninterested in what you have to offer but…" Brandon sighed and leaned back a bit in his chair. "You've already drawn the ire of Lockheed, what possessed you to also annoy Coventry? Right now, you're radioactive in the commonwealth business community. If our deal wasn't practically done, and approved, I would have had you out the door as soon as you showed me your newest offerings. Coventry is just deploying their MML Commandos, and you show up with your own version?"

"Our system has been cleared by commonwealth lawyers," Harry stated defensively. "We checked."

"It still looks like it's derived from industrial espionage," Harry opened his mouth to object but Brandon overrode him, continuing in a voice of iron. "Yes, the idea has been around for a long time, usually as something merc techs threw together for a franken mech, but no one before Coventry made that concept into a production weapon. What you have is different enough to patent as a separate system, but having it ready to go as soon as Coventry debuted their version is the problem. You annoyed Coventry, like I said, and, this is the more important bit from my perspective, you showed the entire sphere your investment in industrial espionage. There's no way you could have moved as fast as you did without some damn good spies. You might play fair with me, but I can't trust that, so in order to protect my own secrets its best if we leave things as they are and go our separate ways."

Brenda gave Harry a look, telling him not to keep pushing. Her instincts were telling her that they would only be running into a brick wall if they tried to keep pushing. Brandon O'Leary wasn't their only option, and it was better to leave things as they were rather than offending him. Given what he had said their best chance would be the Brewers, because if there was one corporation in Commonwealth space that had the political capital to go up against Coventry and Lockheed-CBM it was Defiance. Better to save what they could and use it where they had a chance of success.

"I see you have a substantial investment in dealing with infantry," Brenda said leading the conversation. "Is there a reason for that?"

"Requirements from Mount Asgard," Brandon's mouth was tight as he said that.

"Draconis combine is on the border," Harry acknowledged, following his mother's lead in talking about the Merlin. "Unfortunately, you need the infantry defense, without it things can get a bit tight. Good decision on the jump jets, there were more then a few times when I was on the Drac border I wished I was riding one of the Capellan SE mods for my Thunderbolt."

"You usually ride a heavy?" Brandon turned to the younger man in surprise. "You brought…"

"A demonstration unit, my usual ride is more traditional," Harry's face displaying his distaste for his current ride as he said that, there hadn't been a reason to pull his real mech off the dropship so far this trip. He had spent most of his time at parties or business meetings, the only mech time he had gotten was when he needed to demonstrate that the rotary autocannon worked. "As much as we work with Thunderbolts in the refit yard, our engineers know our own products better."

"Not to your taste?"

"While we license them, the Icarus is a Corean product. Give me a Swordsman or a Whitworth and I'd be happier, I was low man on the totem pole in the demonstration unit we put together so I made do with what I'm assigned." Harry's light voice didn't betray the extreme reaction he had when he had found out about his assignment. The truth was more complicated, of course, but it wouldn't do to tell a rival about the issues Trevlu had with their larger rotary autocannon. Having one blow the arm off an Icarus due to an ammunition feed fault had been disastrous.

"I was under the impression that everything you produced was licensed, and yet you seem to have distinct preferences…" Brandon's inquiry was relatively light, but the question behind it was obvious for everyone to see.

"Whitworth's are a complete reworking, everything but the torso of the mech was changed out." Harry answered promptly. "We couldn't get the armor to bend the way the hegemony could without compromising its structural integrity. Without those curved bits fitting the third laser in became a hazard during ejection, at least in our tests, so we deleted it for more ammo. Everyone knew about the leg issues, so we stole from our Swordsman designs for the legs, then stole the arms as well as it gave back hands which was another constant complaint. The end result is a mech that we did most of the engineering on… of course this was back during the second succession war."

Harry knew that he was lying through his teeth but accepted that as the price of doing business. Having defective tooling as an excuse was much more respectable than what had actually happened. The designs for the torso of the Whitworth had been passed on to the family through the good offices of Stephan Amaris, though his agents had declined to give the Brockton's the rest of the mech. It was a confusing decision, but Harry wasn't a psychotic mass murderer intent on killing his way to the throne so it didn't bother him that much that he didn't understand. Perhaps it had been the revival of the Talos which had interrupted the rest of the deal? Either way letting on a close connection to Amaris here would have been a mistake, especially after what had happened to Apollo militia when they tried to revive the Phoenix as a militia mech. LOKI wasn't subtle and their message had been delivered loud and clear.

"Swordsman's the same I would imagine…"

"That was more reworking the internals to accept an engine and gyro package from the Outworlds," Harry had to wince as he said that. "They were supposed to be making the same thing but when we got our hands on the first shipment…"

"Proprietary design work?"

"Something like that," Harry shook his head. "I'm not an engineer so I can't say if it was on our end or if it was on theirs… but considering their parts mate pretty easily with everything else in the sphere? Or at least I've never heard of an Alliance built engine having trouble fitting into a non-alliance mech. Corean was probably fucking with us even back…" Harry waved his hands indicating the distant past.

 

[GSpectre]

Because i didn't double check where i left off posting... this got left out. I think i managed to fix it when you're in reader mode, but it should be read between chapter 4 and 5, in reality it should be chapter 5 but i can't edit the thread marks here.

August 8th​ 3015
Foxes Den
New Avalon, Federated Suns


"So, I trust you had a good trip?" Hanse teased his long-time friend and confident as Ardan dropped into one of the over stuffed armchairs across from the First Prince. "Your report was certainly enlightening. Though I was surprised that Harry was coming back with you."

"Harry has his own agenda," Ardan replied with a snort. "He's here to sell you new weapons, and not just what they got off the Taurian's."

"Oh? None of that was mentioned in the dispatches you sent from Brockton…" Hanse trailed off meaningfully.

"It would have offended our hosts if we had." Ardan shrugged uncomfortably. "Ran thought, and I agree with him, that it was best not to aggravate them. They're doing us a service again, and if they want to keep what they found quiet we weren't going to offend them. Especially not with what we found on world."

"They don't trust Comstars discretion?" Hanse frowned at that. He had his own questions about just how neutral the Terran based organization really was, but it sounded like the Brockton's had more solid evidence then the straws to the wind he had currently. "Or is it something else?"

"With them… something else. The Precentor assigned to the world is originally from Highspire, and the Brockton's organized both our biological and chemical response units. Needless to say, that assignment went over poorly with the public, and especially with the duke." Ardan said evenly. It was something of an open secret that the CCAF chemical weapons industry had been, and possibly still was, based on Highspire. There was a reason why the border world was the personal holding of Romano Liao, and had been held by main line Liao's throughout the succession wars. "It doesn't help that Duke Brockton is a firm believer in holding grudges and getting even… which is another problem I'm glad to be dumping on your plate."

"That doesn't sound good. Hit me with it," Hanse turned serious when Ardan mentioned a problem. He trusted the other man's good sense, even if he tended to be a bit too idealistic.

"Corean went above and beyond what Michael Davion authorized back in twenty-eight forty-seven. They didn't just take what they owned; they robbed the Brockton system blind. Between the lost tooling and intellectual properties… we're talking a theft that could total trillions of pounds." Ardan's voice was grim as he continued. "They haven't been satisfied with that either, they've launched at least one strike to prune back Trevlu, along with continuing political pressure and an ongoing effort to keep the Swordsman as reviled as it is. If I were you, I would be extremely grateful that Andrew Brockton has trouble keeping his temper, if he hadn't executed the Free Rangers company the way he did… It wouldn't surprise me if he hired a couple of regiments to repossess Corean New Avalon for his family, be damned what a First Prince said."

"They're holding a grudge over that decision?"

"That and the way their Tsamma holdings were ransacked by Corean hired mercs, with DMI and MIIO at the time willing to swear up and down that it was a pirate raid. That finding is why we couldn't do anything to him after he had the Rangers all shot, and Michael tried. Something that's still causing friction between the former UHC worlds and the Capellan March, not to mention the issues the entire affair has generated between us and mercenaries."

"How bad is it?"

"Let me put it this way, you know how the Swordsman is regarded? The Brockton Militia and the Trevlu security run Swordsmen instead of Icarus II's. There are no Valkyries on world, and even mentioning the Centurion as anything other than a light fighter seemed like an iffy idea. Harry Brockton, who I found to be a level headed and personable man, threw a fit when he found out that he was getting an Icarus II as part of the demonstration package he has for you." Ardan shook his head. "It's a planetary grudge that the family has invested time and money in keeping alive. They have a planetary holiday dedicated to cursing Corean, Families get together and burn effigies of the Corean board, past and present."

"Not the Whitworth though…" Hanse frowned as he thought about the problem. He had to admit this was a little beyond what he had thought, and he was going to need to think about it before he figured out how to turn it to his advantage.

"Take a look at the Whitworth's that Corean, and Trevlu, make and compare them to the models from the Whitworth company."

"Ours have hands…" Hanse raised an eyebrow at where Ardan was going with this.

"Yes, they do, then compare one of our Whitworths arms to the arm of a Trevlu Swordsman. While you're thinking on that, do the same thing with the legs. You know our Whitworths don't have the complaints that the Whitworth company made ones have."

"They did the redesign work didn't they?"

"Part of that stolen intellectual property I mentioned earlier. I know you can't really punish Corean for a theft that occurred almost two hundred years ago but…" Ardan paused and grimaced. "This represents a fundamental break down in the feudal obligations your ancestors were sworn to uphold, those obligations are something the Brockton family holds tight. It's why so many of the tainted ended up on Brockton." Both men grimaced at the mention of yet another failure. The tainted were the survivors of various chemical and biological attacks who suffered under the stigma of being survivors while the worlds they were from had died. "While I doubt this was the only time those broke down… this time you really need to at least try and make things right. Especially since I would bet my Victor that the Brockton family has their hooks deep in the CrMM in the Minette area of operations. I visited with elements of the Broken Wheel CrMM and Anjin Muerto CrMM who were on world for refitting and they had a high opinion of the Brockton Family."

"That's going to be difficult," Hanse admitted, mentally he was shoving units around in his head, trying to figure out how to get a front-line regiment into that region of space. "I can't, not wont, but can not give the Brockton family what they deserve if everything you brought back checks out on our end. I'm going to have to think long and hard about how to make things right, but I will at least try. Given the history there I don't think it's a good idea to start moving against the Brockton's even if they do have an inappropriately close relationship with the CrMM. My first instinct is to pull back the 1st​ Chrisholm Raiders to Colorado, give them time to rebuild and reconnect with their roots, but that's going to put a massive hole in the Draconis March so I don't think it's a viable idea. Perhaps moving the second to Brockton directly? Something to run past the cave. Do you have any good news?"

"Well…" Ardan let himself trail off to tease his old friend. "There's a lot more production capacity out that way then has been reported. Trevlu has kept it quiet but I think they rebuilt far more then MIIO or DMI caught wind of, at the very least they aren't just getting engines from the Outworlds like we thought. They've been using it to keep the local march militia units in excellent shape, which is why no one's been interested in reporting it to New Avalon. The units I saw had a lower percentage of militia mechs then usual, although their weight was on the lower end of the spectrum. Lots of forty-ton machines filling in for Enforcers, Centurions, and Dervishes. Just a straw to the wind, but the two command mechs I saw were Thunderbolts, Taurian built, so you might be able to use the Brockton's for further back-channel negotiations with the Concordat. It rubs me the wrong way, we should talk with them directly, but with the way Michaels been acting? You might need those channels to keep the peace out there. You know about the MML system from my report…"

"Thanks. Thanks a bunch for reminding me that despite my efforts we're still behind the Free Worlds League and the Lyran's." Hanse glowered as he said that.

"What did the FWL come up with?" Ardan frowned as he asked that. He didn't have the same access to intelligence that Hanse did, but he was granted an unusual amount of access in his position of one of Hanses most trusted sounding boards. He hadn't heard anything about a new weapons system coming out of the League.

"A medium range missile system, basically from what DMI tells me it's a reloadable rocket pod, size ranging from a ten pack up to a maximum practical forty pack. SAFE, or probably more accurately the Andurien Intelligence Directorate, managed to hide it for long enough that our first hints about the development was when the newest Stalkers coming out of Shiro III were mounting what we thought were twenty packs of long range missiles, instead of the standard ten packs and six packs of short ranged missiles. At least we were luckier then the Capellans, the first they knew about it was when the 1st​ Defenders of Andurien took Palladaine with their brand-new Stalkers leading the way." Ardan could feel the frustration rolling off of Hanse as he described the new weapons system the League had deployed.

"Well, this will make you happier at least, two new autocannon types which I would rate as deployable, a third which while it needs a bit of refinement before I would be comfortable deploying it, jamming issues, and a fourth that needs a redesign before I would be comfortable putting it on anything outside of a proving ground." Ardan smirked at the gob smacked look on Hanses face. "That brightened your day up a bit, didn't it?"

"What? How?"

"Trevlu bases their R and D out of Brockton, or at least their covert R and D, and they had a married couple looking into reproducing the Code Red. They didn't manage that, but they came up with something interesting, a new alloy which allowed them to lighten the barrel of a lower caliber autocannon. I don't need to tell you how those effects the all up weight of the weapon?" Ardan's voice was mild but internally he was debating if he should ask his friend if he needed a bib. Reducing the weight of the barrel on an autocannon meant that you also reduced the weight of the support structures and the number of myomer fibers you needed for its tracking function. "Once they could consistently produce lighter weight cannons, they tried strapping them together in a rotary configuration to duplicate the damage pattern of an LBX… they aren't quiet there yet but at least the lighter model they put together is almost there. The heavier of the two? Not so much, one of their prototypes detonated its ammo in the middle of a demonstration. That was an interesting experience."

"Is that the only problem with the system? And why not use the new alloy for the larger systems?" Hanse asked, all business despite his obvious desire.

"From what I was told the alloy can't handle the pressure needed for larger systems, beyond the lighter calibers… the shells create too much pressure and it splits." Ardan leaned back miming an explosion with his hands. "The only other problem that was reported is that due to the light weight and rigidity of the alloy you can't attach as many control myomers to stabilize it as a traditional barrel so the range is reduced."

"What does the smaller rotary weigh in at?" Hanse asked, thinking hard. While the Suns might be closer to the league in terms of trade, their propensity for civil wars could be disruptive, as demonstrated by Anton's revolt. Due to that Marik family fight several critical orders from the league had been short stopped or were delayed, causing supply chain issues. Unfortunately, the Suns weren't as close to the Lyrans, but he thought he could see a way to turn that around.

"About the same as an GM Whirlwind, why?"

"I think I might just be able to hit a couple of birds with the stone you just handed me." Hanse grinned as he said that, not his trademark foxy grin but a thing full of teeth. "We've been having issues with our league side suppliers, and given we're about to steal a new commonwealth weapon… I didn't think I could find any relief there. But Defiance just discontinued the Sentinel due to the technological decline we've been in since the Star League fell. Their downgraded model wasn't making the grade, not enough fire power. If this RAC is good enough I'm thinking about allowing the Brockton's to export the design specs…"

"Making our acquisition of the MML into more of a trade rather than outright theft?"

"That and paying back the Brockton family for their loyalty, or at least their ingenuity." Hanse paused. "It would be a good way to test the Archon as well. Is she someone we can do business with? Ian thought so, but I can see Michael's hand in that decision. Ian's stories about what went on during his time with the hounds left me decidedly unimpressed."

"Surely not with the Hounds!"

"No, they were as good as their reputation made them out to be according to Ian. It's the other commands he dealt with which make me nervous. The Kell's put together a mercenary unit out of the cream of the Lyran crop… I'm not sure how much talent is left in the LCAF if their best end up in the mercenary market, especially in the militias and regulars."

 

[GSpectre]

June 30th​ 3016
Proving ground Alpha
New Avalon, Federated Suns


"Your thoughts Yvonne?" Hanse asked not taking his eyes away from the binoculars he was watching the experimental mechs through. The Transportation and Resupply working group had already put them through their paces, and submitted an exhaustive report, but Hanse had wanted to see at least one test with his own eyes. You could only get so much from a report after all.

"I wish we hadn't lost the ability to produce Shads." Yvonne answered easily. "The upgrades make it into a much more dangerous beast then it has been. I've already recommended that we issue upgrade kits, sourcing remains an issue though."

"I heard… the question is which of the models? From what I've read there was some dispute over that."

"For those in the two dee configuration, the two dee exe one. Between keeping the second medium, the hurt that the largest MML rack can put out, and bringing the armor back up to nine tons it's a no brainer."

"The loss of range?" Hanse glanced at his champion with a sly smile. "I do read your reports after all."

"The two dee was an ambush predator to begin with, the loss of range isn't going to effect how it fights. All the changes just mean that it can bring a lot more firepower to bear, and that it has a chance of surviving the encounter. We've lost too many of them over the years…" Yvonne trailed off not quite willing to bring up the other problem which had been brought to her attention. "The question is more for the two aches we have in service. The exe one is a simple enough refit, and it brings something to the table for very little investment, but honestly? I'm leaning towards the exe two."

"No concerns about the rotary jamming?"

"Less then I had. No ones in a rush to certify the larger rotary, its still too damn jam prone, but the smaller one is close enough that I feel comfortable officially classifying it as a deployable weapon. Especially with a solid mount like what the Shad has."

"And the Swordsman." Hanse wasn't one to hold an unjustified grudge, but he had to admit what Harry Brockton had said to him stung. Worse still, when Janet Olsen had made her way back to New Avalon the data she had brought with her bore him out at least on the technical side. The raid had neutered a company of Kingstone Leigonairres for minimal damage, an impressive showing, especially without any truly brilliant tactical thinking. The raid had been a straight sugging match, and the mechs had shone. He was personally looking forward to seeing what they could do under a brilliant officer. It was enough that he had Nicholas looking into his accusations on the social and political side.

"We need them Hanse." The use of his first name and not his title made Hanses head snap up. For all that she played at being the grandmother to the AFFS Yvonne kept to a certain level of decorum with him, it was a mental trick she used to keep in mind that he was the first prince and not another of her nephews while doing official business.

"You found something."

"I found a lot, and I'm going to be ripping Michael a new asshole sometime in the near future," Yvonne almost hissed in anger. Her long running feud with his brother-in-law was well known, but it usually manifested in complaints from Michael. "I also want to go back in time and smack your father a few times for good measure."

"You're making me nervous here."

"We need to invest in Trevlu beyond getting them funding to work out the kinks on the larger rotary system, badly. The crucis march militias, with some exceptions, have been gutted completely to reinforce the border marches. Remagen, Malagrotta, and Bastian are running sixty percent militia grade mechs. Point Barrows in even worse shape, eighty percent of their mechs are militia grade. We've pulled way too much over the years and those regions are barely teetering along." Yvonnes jaw was tight as she laid out the damage. "The Dracs keep pulling factories out of their asses, and we needed to find reinforcements from somewhere. The problem is we never replenished those regions, then you had the Cabal happen and all too many members were from the outback. Your father was naturally disinclined to let those families have their mechs back, which further drew down the crucis militias strength. When your father died and Ian took over… Michael used the opportunity to do a bit of creative book keeping and a lot of their front line equipment ended up in the Capellan march."

"Christ," Hanse shook his head as if to dislodge an annoying fly. "Its really that bad?"

"I wouldn't have realized if I hadn't had intensions running checks on Trevlu, and as a result of those checks double checking all of our data for the entire region." Yvonne didn't let on that she had been worried about successionist sentiments, but Hanse was more then smart enough to see it anyway. He had after all been the one to suggest testing his training battalion concept on Brockton. Not that it would work there, the system was too well known and the implications of putting a training facility there of any kind would be destabilizing. "Trevlu's the only game in town out there for both militia, and at least a few regular grade mechs a year, which is worrying in its own right given its been bureaucratically obscured for a long time. Unless you can think of a way to conjure up more production capacity, they're our best chance at quietly fixing this before it goes completely to shit."

"Every company is running flat out, or at least as close to it as their physical plant will allow." Hanse put down the binoculars and closed his eyes thinking hard. "Do we know what Trevlu would need to up their production?"

"Money, or if we can swing it machine tooling. From the reports I've been reading their biggest issues are the engine package and the electronics," Yvonne answered back promptly. "If you authorize the refit kits that's going to be a start. I've been playing with allowing them to have a go at the Wolverine…"

"No. Kallon would throw a fit and they're already too close to Michael for my comfort." Hanse took a deep breath and then let it out slowly. "Pull every one sixty engine we have in the brigade of guards strategic reserve and get them on their way to Brockton with my compliments."

"There aren't going to be that many…" Yvonne warned softly.

"I know, it's the political message I'm after here. The numbers don't matter nearly as much as where they came from." Hanse thought that there should be at least a few engine kits waiting as spare parts, after all the Brigade of Guards had top priority for spare parts and one of the few unit assigned reserves. "Get a message to Andrew Brocton, directly not through Trevlu's corporate headquarters, that we'll pay five percent over list for the next decade on every Swordsman he can give us. Let him know I don't care how he does it, and then watch him carefully. Use the stealthy foxes, I don't trust Nicholas to keep a close enough eye on the situation. He has personal contacts across the periphery borders so let's use that to our advantage. Secondly, our non-interference policy on Blackwell is suspended, put pressure on them. Not enough to drive them out of business, but enough that Wolf thinks its worth it to throw us some tooling the next time he gets back from one of his sojourns in the periphery."

"You think the Wolf brothers were the ones who supplied Blackwell with their new tooling?"

"Who else could have?"

"It would be nice to have another assault around…" Yvonne's voice was shrewd.

"If they're willing," Hanse wasn't that concerned with the Marauder II, as far as he was concerned the Wolfs dragoons could keep it exclusive if they liked. He was concerned about getting them to pony up any extra tooling they could find lying around. "While we're waiting to see if that avenue bears fruit I'm going to need to sit down with Nicholas sometime in the next week or so and see if we can convince anyone involved in the Irian rebuild to let some things fall off the dropship. I'm also going to have to reach out to our ambassador in the Commonwealth to see if they would be willing to sell us any tooling."

"You think they have some to spare?"

"I think the Archon is interested in pulling us away from the free worlds, so they might." Hanse tried to think of what he was missing. "The Sandovals will need to be appeased if it looks like we're building up Crucis at the expense of their march so we need to invest in Robinson as well."

"There isn't much there," Yvonne pointed out.

"I still need to keep them onside," Hanse contemplated sending Aaron a message about the state of the crucis march, but wasn't enthused by the idea. He already had one march on the verge of rebellion, and the entire Brockton mess made him less comfortable with the lack of support he had in the outback. When those systems were little more then a drain on the purse it was one thing, but given they had unexpected depths he was going to have to put some effort into building up his political capital in the region. Especially if Michael was smart enough to start returning some of the equipment he had appropriated.

 

[GSpectre]

July 5th​ 3016
Maharaja Palace
Basantapur, Federated Suns

Mary Garg stomped down the halls of her fathers palace and nearly kick the door to his office off its hinges. Having just returned home on a two-year maternity leave she was already in a foul mood from dealing with her step mother, and getting back into shape from giving birth to twins. The last thing she needed was her father interfering with her life further then he already had. Going down to the mech bay to discover that her Shadow Hawk had been pulled into Trevlu for an upgrade without her knowledge or consent had been the last straw for her strained temper. What she saw when she kicked open the door was enough to make even her temper take a back seat.

Her father, Andrew Brockton, and Prakash Azad where dancing around the room, like the teenagers they had been decades ago, singing at the top of their lungs about how they were the champions. Her father was in point of fact waltzing with the portly Prakash, seemingly ignorant of the dignity he spent so much effort, time, and money maintaining, while Andrew spun in a circle as if trying to tango with an invisible partner.

"What the fuck." That was the only response Mary could muster to the scene in front of her. She had thought it was a quiet comment, but it obviously hadn't been quiet enough. Her father bounced, bounce! Over to her and swung her in his arms as if he were twenty years younger and she was still a little girl.

"Mary! Welcome to the celebration!" Roger's grin was infectious, a true grin of mirth rather then the politicians smile he usually had on.

"What is going on?" Mary said as soon as she sort of recovered from her shock.

"We got the contract! The two dee two is ours!" Andrew cheered, from the floor where he had fallen. "And the Swordsman's endorsed! As many as we can build! We made it… finally."

"Two dee… two? Is that why mech wasn't in its hanger when I went looking for it?" Mary's smile was more of a predators barred teeth as she turned to fully face her father.

"It was supposed to be a surprise for you when you're cleared to pilot again." Roger answered, ignoring the danger he was in. "I got you the first kit off the production line!"

"You're messing with my ride." Mary stated flatly, remembering that none of the three men she was facing had ever been a mech jock. Her father and Prakash had been techs, damn good ones, but still techs while Andrew had done his service as an infantry officer. Why he had chosen that she had no idea, since she knew he was more then capable of piloting a mech.

"It was going to be messed with anyway when you got back to your unit," Prakash, her unofficial uncle, clearly knew her temper was about to blow. "The two dee two is being implemented across the entire AFFS, every two dee Shadow Hawk is being upgraded."

"Wait, why were you looking for your mech? The doctors told you another two weeks!" Roger said with alarm, clearly worried about his eldest.

"Civilians. No offence to your doctor, but he's used to dealing with pampered princesses whose fathers wont let them break a nail without a visit to the doctor. You raised a real woman, not a spoiled little shit." Mary snorted. "besides I got an odd message from my CO and needed to blow off some steam before I came to talk to you."

"Somethings up," Andrew seemed to sober up. "You were on the drac border weren't you? So why would your CO be asking you anything?"

"Because his third battalion was just pulled and reassigned to Colorado to rebuild, and he wanted to know just what the fuck was going on out here that the First Prince was pulling one of his best off the line. Not to mention the second regiment is already in transit to Brockton."

"Chisholm Raiders being moved in this direction…" Roger frowned a bit, the news breaking through his good mood. Then he grinned and deflected. "Makes sense. It's Andrews fault."

"Andrew?" Mary's voice was syrupy sweet, the same tone she had when Andrew had tried to introduce Harry to her as a potential husband. Mary didn't have anything against Harry, but she would be damned before she let anyone decide for her who she was marrying. Her fathers second marriage might have worked out in the end, but she had watched it nearly explode too many times to believe in arraigned matches.

"I might have…" Andrew paused clearly trying to figure out how to say what he wanted delicately before deciding it wasn't worth it. "Gotten a bit blacklisted with the MRBC."

"And?" Mary knew the wily old man, there was more to the story here.

"Well the march militia was hurting for equipment and without being able to hire mercs I arraigned some support for them in exchange for them taking care of a few problems." Andrew replied shamelessly. "It's a mutually beneficial relationship…"

"Christ…" Mary couldn't help but face palm at that explanation. "Did you have to go the most stereotypically lyran route you could?"

"Well… Speaking of being excessively lyran have you thought about what you're going to do after your maternity leave is up?" Andrew asked shrewdly.

"NO. Andrew…" Roger seemed alarmed which was unusual.

"She's a major! And family. Perfect to build our security force!" Andrew defended himself readily.

"Nope. Not happening." Mary shot that idea down as quickly as she could. She loved her family but she wasn't ready to give up her career to be a glorified security guard. "I'll be either back on the front lines with my regiment or taking a teaching slot."

"Are you sure we can't convince you?" Prakash spoke up. "We're going to be expanding shortly and its going to be the sort of challenge that a gifted officer like yourself would relish. Lots of travel to new and interesting places, without the whole people trying to kill you when you get there bit."

"No, even with the panic you probably generated on New Avalon I'm not ready to leave the saddle yet. Not even for a challenge." Mary paused and then narrowed her eyes. "What sort of interesting places?"

"Taurian Concordat for one," Prakash held up a hand to stop the impending explosion. "The First Prince wants as many Swordsmen as we can make in the next five years for the crucis march militia, and he doesn't care how we go about it. We don't have the ability to ramp up our engine lines beyond what they are but over the border…"

"The Bulls!"

"If that's not to your liking we do need a team out in the Outworlds, Alliance Defenders are usually pretty reliable but you never know…" Andrew threw in.

"Or if that's not to your liking, the League needs to be at least explored as an option," Roger reminded everyone.

"Why not the Lyran Commonwealth?" Mary asked in exasperation. Clearly her father and his friends were going to be exploring every possible option for engines. "Or the Canopians?"

"Leagues manufacturers are booked solid rebuilding the FWLM, and what's left over is being hoovered up by the provincial forces I doubt we would get much," Prakash said with a shrug. "Lyrans are being handled by Brenda and Harry who are there on an unrelated project."

"Speaking of which, how would you feel about being a test pilot instead of the head of security?" Roger asked with a false casualness. "We might just have a new offering that needs evaluation soon."

"Within the next two years?" Mary asked calmly. Her father had many faults, but no one could accuse him of not loving his children. As much as it had annoyed her when she was younger his decision to sell the Striker in order to put all three of his children from his second marriage into their own mechs was proof of that Even his decision to buy a trio of Clints rather than more capable machines. He had kept his children in the second line by a clever application of money, though there might be trouble if they ever realized that he had known exactly what he was doing when he bought those mechs. That love was the reason she didn't snap at him despite his constant efforts to get her into a safer line of work, not that she had any intentions of switching careers.

"No, unfortunately, its going to take us at least four or five even with all the data we got from MacEnroe," Roger slumped a bit as he said that.

"Might be less, we don't know how much of the six bee data will work." Andrew disagreed.

"Stick to weapons, which you know. My engineers are telling me four to five years and I trust them to know. From what they're saying the problem wont be the engine switch, it's the revised arms. They're going to be heavier than what was originally mounted so the shoulder joints will need to be reworked, and that takes time." Roger smiled a bit apologetically as he said that.

"Point. My people were working with known frames, and we didn't mess around with anything that would effect the joints," Andrew allowed. "Bringing the conversation back around to our original point; the Canopians are out because they're already having quality control issues. If we ask them, to deliver they would need to produce more and that would mean speeding up their lines, which might end up with one of new built mechs undergoing spontaneous disassembly when the Canopian built engine fails."

Mary opened her mouth to ask, sarcastically, if they were going to try the Dracs or Capellans and then decided against it. Her father had sat her down and explained in detail exactly what the Plague Dogs were when she was younger, and what that meant for the people of Brockton. While the fighting during the first war hadn't been the most savage in the sphere, that honor was reserved for the frontiers of the free worlds league, it had been bad. Nuclear releases were bad enough, but they didn't stigmatize the survivors the way biological or chemical strikes had.

There were always survivors, and most had made their way to Brockton in the aftermath, looking for understanding. By the end of the second war it was estimated that at least ten percent of the planets population were either direct survivors, or descendants of those who had lived through an engineered plague or a chemical strike. There was a living memory, and visceral hatred, brewing away on Brockton. The mere suggestion that they would cooperate with the people who had done that to their ancestors could make things interesting in the Capellan sense of the word. Instead of antagonizing Andrew, and probably her father too if she was being honest, by being a brat she brought the conversation back to the mech they had been talking about.

"So this new offering, what is it?"

"You don't recognize the MacEnroe name? For shame, we need to get the target identifying books updated again." Prakash gently joked. "It's the Crossbow."

"A militia mech? You want me to put my career on hold to test pilot a militia mech?" Mary could feel herself building up a head of steam to match what she had been carrying when she first went looking for her father.

"Not a militia mech, an all up battlemech version." Roger said quickly. "Basantapur-Trevlu's first offering to the Battlemech market."

"Beyond the Swordsman you mean," Andrew pointed out with a sly satisfied smirk.

 

[GSpectre]

Yeah, the designs are helpful, i tend to get stuck in a mindset and everything comes out samey until i get out of it. Seeing what other people think is enoumasly helpful.
Here's what i'm working with for the Crossbow, not ideal, but a solid brawler with a pretty conventional firing pattern for closing and then in close:
CRS-7D Crossbow Mek
Mass: 60 tons
Chassis: Standard Biped
Power Plant: 240 Fusion
Cruising Speed: 43.2 kph
Maximum Speed: 64.8 kph
Armor: Standard
Armament:
2 MML 7
2 Medium Laser
1 Large Laser
Communication System: Unknown
Targeting & Tracking System: Unknown
Introduction Year: 3019
Tech Rating/Availability: D/X-X-F-E
Cost: 4,900,800 C-bills
Type: CRS-7D Crossbow
Technology Base: Inner Sphere (Standard)
Tonnage: 60
Battle Value: 1,162

Equipment		Mass
Internal Structure		6
Engine	240 Fusion	11.5
Walking MP:	4
Running MP:	6
Jumping MP:
Heat Sink:	15	5
Gyro:		3
Cockpit:		3
Armor Factor:	184	11.5

	Internal Structure	Armor Value
Head	3	9
Center Torso	20	28
Center Torso (rear)		9
R/L Torso	14	20
R/L Torso (rear)		6
R/L Arm	10	18
R/L Leg	14	25

Weapons and Ammo	Location	Critical	Tonnage
3 Heat Sinks	RT	3	3
MML 7	LA	4	4.5
Medium Laser	LA	1	1
MML 7 SRM Ammo (14)	LA	1	1
MML 7 LRM Ammo (17)	LA	1	1
3 Heat Sinks	LT	3	3
Large Laser	LT	2	5
MML 7	RA	4	4.5
Medium Laser	RA	1	1
MML 7 SRM Ammo (14)	RA	1	1
MML 7 LRM Ammo (17)	RA	1	1

 

[GSpectre]

August 9th​ 3016
Triad
Tharkad, Lyran Commonwealth

Duke Greydon Brewer sipped his champaign and enjoyed the success of yet another profitable deal. His guests son looked under siege, surrounded as he was by the scions of Lyran industry. Fedrats had a reputation for being a bit soft, and it looked like most of the courts younger daughters were out in force to take advantage of that. He had to smirk as Jessica Malan, one of those odious New Capetown nobles who was too wealthy to ignore, stepped back with her back up like an offended cat. It seemed this Harry had good taste.

"Your boy looks like he's under siege over there, you might want to think about rescuing him," Greydon's soothing baritone came out highly amused as he said that.

"He needs to learn how to be social," Brenda Brockton replied primly. "They should be a good enough school until he meets someone of substance, worthy of his time. Your daughter wasn't available?"

"She's active duty at the moment, finished up her five and is putting in another tour before she even thinks about retiring," Greydon replied, keeping his dislike of the idea out of his voice. Jacqueline was the apple of his eye and Harry Brockton wasn't nearly good enough for her. Rather then continue he switched topics to something a little more comfortable. "I'm sorry I couldn't help you with the Sentinel license but there are political issues in play here that you might not be aware of."

"You mean how Lockheed-CBM and Coventry are annoyed with us?" Brenda enquired her tone a touch challenging.

"No, they couldn't be an issue on their best day," Greydon swirled his glass and contemplated how to put this delicately. "You have two issues from my perspective, the first is that your dispute with Corean is out of hand, it is one thing to deal with a competitor, even harshly at times but… that is best done through your own offices, or if you lack the means through appropriately bonded mercenary's. The incessant war of yours should have been finished years ago, one way or the other, not dragged on as if you were a Leaguer."

"We have very few options for dealing with Corean as you put it," Brenda bit out. "That we have refused to give in is to our credit, we are after all still in the fight."

"You are losing, and don't have the sense to surrender before you face annihilation," Greydon retorted sharply. "Involving the ministry of justice was a mistake, no matter how much damage you deal to Corean through that move, it was an admission of weakness."

"We haven't involved the ministry of justice though?" Brenda felt her face scrunch in confusion. "In point of fact things have been kept deliberately quiet for the past decade or so on our part."

"You mean after your board screwed up and executed some hirelings because they couldn't get at the people they wanted too…"

"That wasn't the board, that was my husband," Brenda admitted with a grimace. "The family lost a member in their little raid, and we have obligations. It's unfortunate that Trevlu was tarred with that action but they really didn't have anything to do with it. The Brockton family offered the contract, and extracted the blood price we told the rangers we would."

"that's the attitude which makes my board incredibly wary of doing business with you directly. Couldn't you have just hired a retaliation strike?"

"Against New Avalon? The only mercs who would be crazy enough to take that contract are McCarron's lot and letting that bunch of war criminals loose on New Avalon isn't politically survivable… or sensible."

"You couldn't get at Steward?"

"We don't have the contacts… Operating in the league is a whole new ball game, one where we don't know the rules. We've been suns exclusive for our entire existence as a company."

"You do occasionally stray across borders though, there are rumors about how the Magistracy and Concordat managed to procure the license and plans for the Swordsman."

"We have excellent contacts in Samantha, and the rules have been made painfully clear to us." Brenda couldn't help but snort when she said that. The Taurians were painfully earnest, letting them know exactly how much rope they had before they were kicked out with any assets they couldn't recover in time being subject to nationalization. It was refreshing to have such clear lines, and rules, a major change from operating in a successor state even their native suns.

"Be very wary there," Greydon intoned solemly. "The culture of vendetta is taken extremely seriously in the league. If you take a shot, make damn sure you don't miss. Otherwise you will be dealing with retaliation until the stars go out, its something we Lyran's are all too familiar with."

"That's … unfortunate." Brenda pursed her lips. She had plans to continue onto the league and while the information Greydon provided was concerning, it was something she was perfectly comfortable dealing with. Worse came to worse she would be sure to play up the families reputation, better that league nobles thought them bioweapons mad then weak and a target. "You said two reasons?"

"The other is related, the rim worlds are still a sensitive topic here. Companies that don't want to end up tarred with the tyrants brush need to step carefully."

"Ah. It's the Vulcan isn't it?"

"Exactly. I cannot allow the Defiance name to be linked to anything related to the Rim Worlds, even at a degree removed. While it wouldn't ruin the company, the reputational damage would take decades to repair."

Brenda shot the older man a look as he said that. She was well aware of the rumors which never seemed to go away completely about how Defiance had managed to put the Zeus into production as fast as they had. The design had gone from paper to the battlefield in just three years, something that she didn't think was possible. Given the number of similarities it had to the Rampage? She was betting the Zeus was just a lightened Rampage, with some cosmetic modifications. She could see where Greydon was coming from if that was the case, especially if links to the rim worlds still had that much power after all this time.

Despite the Commonwealths reputation as one of the most liberal of the successor states they did keep LOKI on hand. She had thought that after all this time a repeat of what had happened to Apollo Mechworks was unlikely to occur, but it sounded like there was a deeper cultural issue at play. Certainly, no First Prince would order their security service to hang the entire board of a company for producing a mech. Then again, the First Princes didn't have the options that an Archon had. It seemed to her that the Phoenixes incredibly brief resurrection as a militia mech had a deeper impact on the commonwealth business community then she had thought. Of course, an entire board of directors swinging in the very place where Mohammed Selim was once lynched was a pretty emphatic statement. Of course Apollo wasn't destroyed as a company. To this day they produced a mix of Gladiators, Crossbows, and Ymirs for the militia market. A fact which probably made that long ago statement by the Archon via LOKI stick in any sensible commonwealth business mans mind.

"So no license for us, but you are willing to let us buy components from your Gibbs factory…"

"That would not be something that would come to the publics attention." Greydon confirmed. "Between putting the Sentinel back into production, and experimenting with the new weapons system you sold us, it wouldn't be out of line to keep the lines of communication going. A few one sixty rated engines are hardly going to raise an eyebrow."

"It's still a connection though."

"Not politically," Greydon disagreed. "Something you're going to need to learn over at Trevlu, battlemechs are more then a war fighting system, they are a political statement. It's one thing to provide components to a company which has… lets call it a publicity problem. It's another to have one of your designs walking off the lines from that very same company. I know you've been active in the militia market for some time, and you have kept at least some proper production, but you haven't needed to deal with the political issues an inadvertent statement can cause."

"We've had issues with acceptance for at least one of our designs," Brenda corrected him mildly, not showing her temper at his condescending tone. "Those issues have recently become a thing of the past though."

"Keep a close eye on that, you never know when those issues will crop back up," Greydon offered his advice, slightly apologetic. "Sorry the whole issue has been on my mind recently. It's going to be a dog of a problem for me with the Sentinel, the downgraded units we were forced to produce have damn near ruined the designs reputation. It's going to be an uphill battle to get it accepted again."

 

[GSpectre]

August 27th​ 3016
Davion Summer Palace
Argyle, Federated Suns

"Operatively interfering with the rebuilding of Irian is turning out to be impossible. I apologize my prince but SAFE is being unusually effective at maintaining security over the entire project, including the logistics," Nicholas reported blandly. "Efforts to procure tooling at the source have also run into difficulties, the tooling which is being used is supposedly being supplied by Andurien, but we can find no evidence of any such industrial activity. Fortunately, one of my people came up with a work around that we believe can work."

"Duchess Humphreys isn't willing to work with us?" Hanse asked with a raised eyebrow. Catherine Humphreys was notorious for being a contrary cuss, and hating Janos Marik for his focus on the commonwealth border. If she was being recalcitrant then MIIO really needed to have another look at the situation, because something was going on there beyond the usual free world's politics.

"She was remarkably evasive when approached," Nicholas confirmed. "Not even dangling our report on the coupe was enough to budge her from her position."

"She was willing to forgo vengeance for her aunt in order to protect this secret?" Hanse clarified, just to make sure he was understanding this correctly.

"Correct. It is most vexing. I've had to redirect most of our free world assets onto the problem, because there is something going on there and we don't know what it is." Nicholas actually sounded annoyed for a change. His normal calm demeaner clearly being tested by this latest development. "SAFE can be spotty at times, defensively they have traditionally been fairly effective especially against the provincial intelligence agencies but this jump in competence makes me nervous."

"Keep on that, changes like what you're talking about don't happen overnight and I can't see how we would have missed it," in the privacy of his own head Hanse was wondering if it was time for Nicholas to retire. He was missing too much these days, between Brockton's surprise moves and now SAFEs sudden competency the surprises were coming far too often. "You did mention an option earlier?"

"One of my proteges came up with it, would you care to hear from him yourself, or would you like me to brief you?"

"Do I know this protégé of yours?"

"I presume so, you did grant his sons request to be assigned to the hounds for his fifth year."

"Quintus," Hanse immediately recognized who was being talked about. A good man, and one whose mind could be as twisty as one would want from a spy. "Bring him in."

Nicholas left Hanse alone on the balcony to contemplate the sunset. Despite the truly exceptional view Hanse mind was troubled. The Inner Sphere had been stable for a long time, it was a paradigm he had meant to shatter in his own time, ending the succession wars decisively in favor of the only rightful clamant, but there were currents below the surface which threatened his plans. He knew he needed to deal with internal opposition, his brother-in-law was particularly bad at concealing his ambition, the scope of what he faced had come as a surprise. Perhaps he needed to steal a page from Janos book, his pause to rebuild had been remarkably successful. It was an attractive idea, especially as it gave his scientist time to digest the find from Hadlestad.

In a few years the Suns would be on the ascent, their scientific prowess unmatched except possibly on terra. Time was the one thing that he seemed not to have. There were rumblings coming out of the Draconis March that the Combine was testing a new weapon, which if true meant that five new weapons systems had been developed in the past handful of years. The race Hanse had thought he had to himself was turning out to have a remarkably crowded field. He still had faith that his scientist would be the ones to win, to bring the Suns back to their glory days before the others managed it, but it was a lot tighter than he liked.

Especially when he contemplated the industrial situation that the Suns found themselves in. He had known that things were bad, supplies being inadequate at the front for even a prince of the realm, but he hadn't realized just how bad it had gotten. Almost the entirety of the suns heavy industrial base was engaged in repairing what they could, leaving him little margin for error. Hanse didn't want to admit it but finding out just how hollow the Crucis march reserves were had shaken him badly. It was why he was willing to take chances with semi friendly states, an action he never would have contemplated when he was still just the heir. Before he could continue obsessing over the problems facing him Nicholas returned leading Quintus onto the balcony.

"Duke Allard, it is good to see you again," Hanse shook the man's hand, slipping back into his politicians' mindset. He Allard was a man he had met, but he knew of him more then he actually knew the man. "Nicholas tells me you might have a solution for our tooling problem?"

"I have an idea, my prince," Quintus replied cautiously. "The working group I'm assigned to does more work on the confederation then the League, but the conflict between those two states means there is a bit of overlap. We were looking for ways to provoke the League into conflict with the confederation when the orders about machine tooling were passed down and I think we have a way to achieve both objectives."

"The League is looking pretty exhausted after their latest batch of civil war," Hanse said cautiously. He was all for anything that would remove the distraction of the confederation for a bit of time and allow him to focus on the real enemy, but from the reports he had read the League just wasn't in good enough shape to provide that distraction.

"Otherwise, Janos would have responded to the confederation backing Anton?" Quintus asked rhetorically. "That was a consideration, but we think with the right incentive we can push him over the edge. Janos, and the League as a whole, has traditionally been focused on the Commonwealth with the Confederation being a decidedly secondary theatre. The current celestial wisdom has pulled a bit of interest towards his realm, but issues with the Anduriens have prevented Janos from shifting his military focus. That said, with the right pressure we think that Janos can be induced to vent his spleen on the confederation."

"Lots of abstracts there, walk me through your idea in detail," Hanse asked, his voice mild but his eyes sharp as he looked for a snow job. He had found that people who proposed operations in a general sense didn't have the specifics nailed down enough to execute their ideas, which made him warry.

"Kali Yama has been receiving extensive federal support to develop a new mech," Quintus ignored the brief flash of annoyance on Hanses face. The First Prince didn't like being reminded that his own realm was behind the Lyran's and the Leaguers. "From what our operatives could glean its supposed to be a forty-ton design to fill line units facing the Capellans, something a little heavier armed then the Hermes II."

"Something like our Swordsman? And why do you think its meant to face the Capellan's?"

"Exactly like our Swordsman, designed with countering the Vindicator in mind. As for why we think its aimed at the Capellans? The weight. A low-end medium would have limited utility against the heavier mechs the commonwealth traditionally deploys. Now the interesting thing from our perspective is that Kali Yama needed to buy several new sets of tooling, they put the orders in before Anton kicked off, and its almost ready to begin delivery." Quintus didn't allow the intensity of the first princes gaze to put him off. "With that said, security has been unusually tight on the project, until last year when holes started appearing. Initially it was thought that SAFE was baiting a trap, but from what several of our operatives in the Maskirovka tell us MASK has gotten a few people into the project. My analysists are divided as to why, but the leading theory is that the rushed nature of the design has led to problems and the Kali Yama higher ups want to buy time to fix things. Whatever the reason we have an opportunity here. The new the tooling is going to be transported from Loyalty on a single jumpship, with minimal security, in a security through obscurity gambit. The idea my working group has put forward is that we hijack the ship, recover the tooling, and then dump the ship Jasmine system for the Capellan's to recover."

"Loyalty is very close to Atreus…" Hanse waffled a bit, buying himself time to think.

"That is precisely why we think this can be pulled off." Quintus said mildly. "Anton's men haven't been completely cleared out of the LCC, several that we know about were successful in keeping their heads down and cleaning up after themselves."

"What would we need to pull this off?" Hanse was coming around to this plan. Between the Anton loyalists, who would be vulnerable to Capellan blackmail, active Maskirovka presence in the project, and the fact that the jumpship would end up over Sian being repaired before the Capellans put it into service, there were enough indirect indicators to point the finger squarely at the Capellans for the theft. Especially given they would be on the hunt for machine tooling to put the FireBee back into production. "And what's the risk factor here?"

"In terms of assets… a naval crewed jumpship, Star Lord or Monolith if we can swing it, unless you want to pull one of our Mammoth class dropships for the raid. The equipment is supposed to be transported in four mules which are going to be docked to the FWNS Ire, a tramp class. So, we need at least enough jump collars to transport four mules and a pair of assault ships for our marines." Quintus outlined the retrieval force easily. "Our risk factors would be on insertion, the operatives we put on the ships might just have to deal with competition from MASK or Death commando teams looking to do what we intend. We have assets in place who can be tasked for this mission, already cleared by SAFE, so they aren't much of a worry. With assets in place, we can abort should this prove to be a trap without contact. Again, CCN assets might become an issue, but our people will know if that's going to come up before our ships begin combat operations. Extraction will be through dead systems, so it is unlikely that the FWLN will intercept."

"It sounds like you were already planning an operation," Hanse was distracted as he mentally started shoving units around. He would need to get with Yvonne but if the Capellans and the League went after one another he could take advantage. The Tikonov salient was right there, and the AFFS had been dreaming of taking that world for generations. If the Capellans weren't too distracted, well widening the defensive corridor around Marduk was a worthy objective. He would just need to build a task force and stick it on Chesterton or Edwards, waiting for the results of the operation.

"We were going to attempt a disruption operation," Quintus put mildly. "Perhaps some sabotage."

"Very well, your operation is approved, start putting together the pieces you need."

 

[GSpectre]

September 11th​, 3016
Ducal Residence
Brockton, Federated Suns

Andrew hadn't been entirely pleased to be called back home before the installation on Basantapor had been completed, but needs must when the devil drives. Honestly, he had expected better from the local government, they usually handled things without needing his presence. Unfortunately, it looked like the brewing conflict between the second Chisholm Raiders and local interests was something that would require him to mediate. Meaning that he had to put away his industrial concerns to once again don the little used mantle of duke of Brockton.

The issue was one of priorities, the pirates of the region were beginning to show signs of organization and the local government wanted the 2nd​ out doing anti-piracy patrols. The second was more interested in getting themselves organized and back up to strength. Being a feeder unit for the first Chisholm Raiders, their mechs were decidedly second rate and from what Andrew had been reading they had transferred their best over before being dispatched to the outback. With the Brockton planetary government not being in their chain of command the Raiders felt that they weren't required to bow to its wishes, leading the government to call him back as their biggest political gun.

"It's not going to work," Captain Henry Bauer said with certainty as he strode into the duke's office. A line officer by inclination he had been tapped to pull a staff tour this rotation, from the rumors he had picked up it was polish before he was promoted to major and took over as the XO. "Whatever inducements you think you can wave under my nose to get me and the boys hopping to your tune, we've seen it before."

"Well, that's one way to start a conversation," Andrew said mildly. "Not surprising given your service jacket, but less helpful than I had hoped."

"Look I get that things are getting a dicey out here, it's part of the reason you had a front-line regiment moved to the outback, but our primary responsibility is to protect the industrial assets of Trevlu and the yards." Bauer hated his orders, but he would fulfil them faithfully. "You have a march militia; they're supposed to be the ones who keep piracy in check."

"They do, for the most part, but as you said things are getting dicey out here and they have the wrong equipment mix." Andrew countered. "It's not the mechs, when they engage, they trounce whomever the pirates are, it's their transport assets."

"And we aren't in any better shape," Henry sighed as he admitted that. "We have a, count it one, merchant class jumpship assigned to us. We aren't in any better of a position to chase after pirates then the marchers are."

"But you can meet them in space," Andrew argued back. "Look I get that your new to the region, and probably read up on the situation out here but…"

"No buts, I did. The Anjin Muerta and Broken Wheel marchers are actually better equipped than we are in terms of transport assets. They have a battalion mover, and the best we have are Unions!" Henry's frustration began to leak out. He knew that the duke he was badgering had retired as a major, but that had been a retirement rank he had actually topped out as a captain. He hadn't been responsible for space assets, or the logistics of a campaign, and that's what he was asking the second to do; fight a campaign against the pirates.

"It's a Dictator, most of the march militia ride around in Lions," Andrew cut the younger man off before he could continue. "We have lift yes, hell I could personally give you enough lift to supply your regiment on an invasion campaign out of my own resources. What we don't have is secure lift, or lift that can defend itself outside of atmosphere."

"Dictator… wasn't that the SLDF ship which was retired in favor of the Overlord?"

"Yes, just like the Lion was being phased out for the Union."

"They're military ships, I'm not sure I'm seeing the problem…" Henry admitted slowly. "They have guns and armor, yes?"

"And they were being phased out for the same reason the militia is having issues. Neither design was built for independent operations, they don't have fighters. When the militia needs to make a contested landing, or even contest the orbitals, they either need to bring along a carrier or have an established ground base." Andrew's frustration leaked into his voice. "Committing the militia to the sort of active campaign that needs to be fought against the pirates would be akin to standing them up against a wall and shooting them myself. Pirates aren't inherently stupid; they know what we have and when it matters, they can bring enough fighters to down our transports before the militia makes planetfall."

"You do know that we're about a battalion under strength, and all of our dropships have chits for a yard overhaul?" Henry asked, understanding finally the issue.

"I do actually know that, no one's asking you to jump right into putting a lance on every world in the operations area," Andrew carefully ignored the 'could have fooled me' which Henry muttered under his breath. "What we want is for you to at least look at planning some independent deployments. Your Leopards are going to be out of the yard's hands in a couple of months, give us something… even if it's not more than a bare bones plan."

"I can give you a plan, but it's not going to be feasible," Henry shook his head. "I would rather be straight with all of you then blow smoke up your collective asses."

"What are your issues? Aside from the lack of mechs, which I might be able to help you with."

"You already are, we have about a company and a half of salvage being looked over in the mech yard. Once your engineers and techs sort out what can be salvaged and what's junk, we will be a little closer to being up to strength, along with the mechs that Trevlu is producing." Henry acknowledged that the noble was at least trying to be helpful, even if he did have his own agenda. "Look, even if we had a full-strength regiment, we don't have the jumpers to move around like we would need to. Most of the ones which were assigned to us were Capellan march militia, and they stayed in their march. The others got pulled into a maintenance rotation, because this was supposed to be a defensive deployment."

"I'm going to have to rattle some cages, but I might be able to get you at least a collar or two on the regular liners in this region," Andrew pursed his lips. He doubted that he would be able to get a jumpship freed up, but places on one of the regular routes? That he might be able to swing.

"Which doesn't help because we need to be mobile in order to respond to threats. It does you no good if we're stuck thirty light years from the point of contact…"

"DMI and MIIO aren't completely useless."

"And what's their success rate?"

"Fifteen percent," Andrew admitted with a wince.

"That's actually not bad, especially for predicting pirates," Henry was impressed by the number. Most pirates were so random that you would have better luck throwing a dart at the map of your OA then trying to make an accurate prediction of what targets they would hit. "If you can find us the lift we might be able to break out a few lances to cover likely targets… which brings us to the next problem, fighters."

"How badly are you understrength?"

"The only class we actually match our TOE is in interceptors, our dog fighters are criminally under strength and we don't have a single attack bird. I know you said we could actually fight pirates in the air but… unless something changes, we aren't going to be able to do more than prune back their fighters."

"That's a problem…" Andrew cocked his head to the side. He could see a solution but it wouldn't work without the colonels okay. "How do you feel about field testing something?"

"I'd need to talk it over with the colonel, but we might be open to it. Why?"

"I have connections to Ajeet Aerospace."

"I told you, we have interceptors. More Centurions aren't going to do us much good."

"I know, how about Vulcans?"

"It's out of testing?" Henry asked his eyes narrowing. He had heard about Ajeet Aerospace's attempt to put the Vulcan back into production, but beyond the initial announcement he hadn't heard anything about it. Certainly not that it was being deployed operationally.

"The five en model was recently certified, the fire support bird is still in limbo though." Andrew frowned as he thought about the favors he would need to call in to get the first squadron off the production lines. It might be possible, but it might very well not be. The UCH nobility would have their own call on the bird, and he wasn't sure just how many of them would use their influence. The Rim reputation might keep a few of them back, but given the dearth of attack fighters in the region even that wouldn't hold people back for long.

"Tricky," Henry found himself drumming his fingers along his thigh. "I might be able to convince the colonel… but I might not. We aren't the sort of unit which has the technical support you would need to really run a trial like that, so any endorsement we gave the bird wouldn't be worth the paper it was printed on. Assuming we could keep them flying that is, our techs have never worked on the bird so there might be issues. You wouldn't know where to find a couple of Stukas would you?"

"I have contacts but they aren't infinite." Andrew replied with a bitter laugh. "Vulcans would be the best I could do, and even that's not certain."

"I'll talk it over with the colonel and the head air tech," Henry shrugged slightly. It didn't cost him anything to offer that, especially since he was sure that the offer would be turned down. Besides being an almost completely new air frame to the AFFS, the Vulcan still had a reputation. Links to the Rim Worlds Republic and Stephan Amaris weren't something that any right-thinking person wanted to have, even if it was in the form of badly needed equipment. Although they might just end up using the dukes' connections to replace their Sabers. The Centurion was the hardier bird, and they weren't first on New Avalons priority lists for supplies. Otherwise they would be getting Sparrowhawks instead of the decidedly inferior Sabres as replacements.

"Do what you can, please." It cost Andrew a bit to add that last word, but he did it anyway. His wife had managed to pound it into his head that while politeness cost you nothing, the rewards were worth the miniscule extra effort.

"Alright. I'll try and get the colonel to release a few lances as well, but that's not going to happen until we've finished out the refit cycle. A lot of our mechs were worn down."

"I read the reports," Andrew grimaced as he said that. Those had been grim reading, too many of the machines had broken parts or missing systems. The Raiders had been operational for far too long in his opinion without a real refit. "At least your Shadow Hawks should be coming back to you better than new. You're getting refit kits straight from the factory here."

"Any way I could convince you to switch up production and get us Whitworths rather than the Swordsman we've been assigned?" Henry asked, slightly uncomfortable. He knew that the Swordsman was the dukes pet project, but between the regiments need for fire support designs rather than direct engagement mechs and the Swordsman's retention of the lingering stench of the Rostovs it wasn't a design that he particularly wanted. Just the arguments alone between mech jocks about who had to take the Swordsman would be a headache, one he didn't need.

"That I can't do, your orders came down from New Avalon. Since they're the ones paying…" Andrew shrugged lightly. "Besides we're on contract to get as many of them out the door as possible. We've had to send a buying commission to the Outworlds and the Taurian's for engine kits, all on the First Princes dime. Not to mention he cleared out the brigade of guard's stockpile of one sixties to send our way. When the first prince wants something this badly…"

"Forget I asked," Henry apologized, internally his mind was working overtime. This was the first he had heard about the First Prince getting behind the Swordsman and pushing, perhaps things had changed? A couple of barracks room rumors would need to be started, if only to make his life easier.

 

[GSpectre]

December 12th​ 3016
Zenith Jump point
Daneshmand, Free Worlds League

"Even with the staff you brought along this isn't going to be an easy sell," Harry stated flatly. The failure of their Commonwealth adventure was firmly fixed in his mind, he had thought that they had an easy path to achieving their goals but that hadn't proved to be the case.

"Dame Catherine is invested in aerospace, as a former fighter jock she knows it like the back of her hand, and being a canny politician, she plays to her strengths," Brenda gently chided her son. "Losing Andurien Industries completely is not something she is willing to continence. They needed to sell their production equipment for the Intruder to Andurien Aerotech to repair what they could after the league retook Andurien. Losing the Excalibur as well? That's going to finish off the company, which is an economic hit she cannot afford to take. Her Mosiro Mechworks might have kept the archipelago in the Dutchy, but it's been bleeding money at an unsustainable rate."

"I don't doubt she'll be interested in what we're selling… what I doubt is that she's going to be willing to deal." Harry countered. "We do have a lot to offer her, but the price isn't going to be something she is willing to pay. Especially not given her political position. She's on the outs with Atreus, going to a foreign supplier for anything is going to be politically difficult."

"I'd say it's a gamble, she did invest the time and funds into rebuilding Irian…" Brenda pointed out. She was well aware that it was a weak point in her argument, if the Brockton's got what they wanted the political capital the dame had earned would be burnt.

"Possibly, I'm just not getting my hopes up." Harry's down tone was enough to convince Brenda that this wasn't just about the industrial deals they had been striking. His attempts at courting while they had been in the commonwealth hadn't gone well, to put it mildly. The only families who had expressed interest in him were those looking to loot Trevlu, and they hadn't hidden that. It had been a congo line of humiliation for him, and after his experience on New Avalon, she was worried that his self-confidence had been badly damaged.

"Chin up, from your father's last letter things are looking up at home. Between Roger and Prakash's efforts our social isolation is looking like it's going to be a thing of the past by the time your kids are ready to start dating."

"If I manage to have kids that is," Harry grumped out. "You really think things are going to be any better on Andurien than they were on Thakard?"

"Can't be worse," Brenda acknowledged. "So, what's your guess on what the dame is going to do with what we're offering?"

"She's going to pull a hostile takeover, Andurien Industries isn't a company her family owns, but if she can pull them into being a subsidiary of Andurien Aerotech?"

"Probably. She does seem to be determined to concentrate as much industry into her family's hands as possible. So, the question we need to ask is what is she going to be willing to pay us with?"

"My guess? Data. Her people working on Irian seem to have done more repairs than replacements if the news feeds we've gotten are anything to go by. She might be willing to let us license the Stingray, but given how protective of that design the Humphreys have been?"

"Point." Brenda pursed her lips as she considered that. The Stingray should have been licensed out to more than one manufacturing location given its prevalence in the FWLM, but at the moment it was confined to one production site. Andurien Aerotech's factories were surprisingly productive, especially for a Liao-built facility, which made Brenda suspicious. Liao production of any type was infamous for its shoddy workmanship, and that Andurien Aerotech produced enough Stingrays for the entire FWLM made her think that there was something else going on there. That was part of the reason she had been open to taking this side trip before heading home. While buying machine tools had been a bust, they had achieved the bare minimum of their objectives in the Commonwealth. That didn't help Harry though, he would need some political capital of his own when he took over as duke, and the trip hadn't given him that. There were no additional orders for Brockton made goods, and the majority of their profits were being spent buying engine kits from Defiance Gibbs, necessary but not a visible benefit to the people of Brockton. The family had kept their population, and the planetary government happy, by bringing home business. Without a major win to his name, Harry would be forced into being an agricultural salesman, a position that she knew he would hate. Harry was his father's son in that his interests lay outside of the life sciences, and he found agriculture to be boring.

"We might be able to convince her to throw in a copy of the Capellan archives from when they held Andurien," Harry worried his bottom lip as he said that. "It's not the sexiest information around but it's something that the college could use. Moving away from being known solely for the life sciences would reduce the stigma its graduates operate under. I think we could get support from New Avalon to put together a damn good Capellan culture and history department."

"That…" Brenda thought about the idea for a moment before continuing. She was well aware of the tension between New Avalon and New Syrtis, as was Harry evidently, and what he had just proposed would take advantage of that tension. It was good to see that her lessons on politics hadn't gone completely to waste. "Is a good idea. Do you have an idea of the valuation we should assign to the data?"

"It's going to be star league vintage information, my guess would be that it's going to be heavily concentrated on cultural and security issues." Harry speculated aloud. "That said Andurien was a Commonality capital during the Star League, and we haven't managed to capture one of those. The archives will be a treasure trove for historians, and MIIO, so it's going to be expensive."

"That I knew, the question is just how expensive it's going to be for us to get our hands on it."

"Data like that… I'd say about half the cost of what we're going to be offering dame Catherine, if not more. Information is power, and control over information has made the high nobility into what it is today. We're going to be asking for a copy of what the Humphreys consider their birthright, especially after they lost so much when Kanata was nuked. I know that for a copy of the alliance-era cores we've kept, I'd be pushing for a price in the trillions of pounds range, at the very least."

"Partial credit, I would argue," Brenda grinned as she pounced on the teachable moment. "You're underestimating the cultural factors in play. Yes, information is a nobles birthright, but the information we'd be after if we put a deal like the one you're proposing on the table would be tainted in the Humphrey's eyes. Keep in mind that they hate the confederation with a passion verging on fanaticism, that's going to devalue the archives."

"They can hate the cappies all they like, they'll still fight tooth and nail to keep control over every scrap of information they gleaned from them. It's a trophy if nothing else."

"Trophies would be original copies of the documents that are in the archives, physical things they can bring out to show off," Brenda argued back, pleased that Harry wasn't just accepting her word. "If they valued the data for itself they would be using it."

"You think they aren't?" Harry asked, slightly surprised. "After the Humphreys School of Warfare was nuked the Humphreys training academy was set up awfully quickly, and you know which enemy they're focused on."

"You're thinking that they're using their data like the Brewers are?" Brenda asked, mildly impressed by the speculation.

"At least a part of it, Humphreys has too good of a reputation for producing officers who understand the Capellan mindset and who are well versed in impromptu combined arms. You would never get them to admit it, but both of those specialties imply to me at least that they've used their extensive access to Capellan documents to build their curriculum."

"The League is known for their focus on combined arms…"

"The FWLM favor using their lighter conventional elements as scouts and skirmishers, think an epee, the Anduriens tend to have heavier elements in the mix and are closer to our hammer and anvil tactics, something we picked up from the Capellans and refined." Harry shook his head in disagreement. "The RCT formations we use are better than anything the Capellans field, but the same idea is present in both our RCT tactics and the CCAF's use of their militia formations. Hold ground with tanks and infantry, and use your mechs as the maneuver element and breakthrough unit. The difference is our tankers and infantry are professional, and we can use them offensively if the situation requires it, whereas the CCAF emphasizes the defensive aspects of such tactics and does it on an ad hock basis."

"So how do we use our speculation to our advantage during the negotiations?" Brenda was glad to see Harry coming out of his shell. She was of the opinion that had he acted like this when they were in the commonwealth he would have gotten better offers, putting her on point for the negotiations had robbed him of some of his self-confidence. Part of that was her fault, she had after all given him a spectacular tongue-lashing about his lack of preparations, but mostly she blamed his father. It wasn't intentional, but his decision hadn't been the best from the perspective of getting Harry ready to inherit. Letting him fail and learn on his own would have been wiser, and the display of confidence in him would have helped him recover from his mistakes on New Avalon.

 

[GSpectre]

January 3rd​ 3017
Sanromea Dropship Yard
Brockton, Federated Suns

Andrew wasn't quite sure just what this latest meeting was about. Despite the profitability of the dropship yards, and the critical importance of the jumpship refit slips, he had little to do with the aerospace industry. Yes, he owned it, but that was through managers. He preferred to leave decisions in their hands as he was well aware that he was a rank amateur when it came to making business decisions around the industry. The last time anyone from his family had invested more than money had been several generations ago when they had steered an asteroid mining subsidy through parliament, and that had been at the request of the planetary ecology party as part of a raft of environmental regulations. This is why it came as such a surprise that his managers were requesting a meeting about the yards.

"Well you have me here," Andrew looked around the room they were meeting in and was surprised by its spartan appearance. He had gotten used to the sumptuously appointed meeting rooms that his other industrial concerns had or the palatial ones he had used on Basantapur, this was a rather different approach and he wasn't sure what it said about the business. Perhaps he needed to allot more funding here? "What do you need?"

"Reassurances," Josaphine Needlemyer spoke up after she had shared a look with her fellow executives. Andrew only recalled her name due to the briefing he had gotten from his staff on the way over, another oversite he would need to correct. "You're looking to expand production of the GE 3000 drive system with an eye towards duplicating the lines. That's not a small move, and you've been consistent in where your priorities lay. We've been sucking hind teat for a long time, so your interest is getting us rather nervous. We wanted to make sure you weren't convinced by offworlders of some damn fool notion like trying to propel a warship by strapping dropship drives to the frame in bundles."

"Is that even possible?" Andrew asked, a bit taken aback.

"No it's not, but I wouldn't put it past the fools in charge of Challenge systems to sell you on the notion in the name of recovery," Vernon Strand spoke up. "Before Jalastar bought them out with your money they were floating some pretty out-there ideas…"

"And they have exactly the right sort of bait you would go for," Josaphine took up the thread of the conversation again. "If they're pressing you for engines I'll bet you pounds to pence that they say they have the data needed to put together a core forge, if only they had the right heavy equipment."

"If they had that I would have known," Andrew said sharply. He was slightly offended by the presumption that he would be taken for a ride by some sharp-talking businessmen. He did own an aerospace company, after all, he would be a fool to not have asked the people in the room their opinion on any investments he made in the area. Then again… no one had asked about their idea for Andurien so the accusation wasn't that unwarranted.

"Not saying you wouldn't, but from our perspective? You haven't exactly been a paragon of dynamism in our sector like you have been for the mech industry." Josephine's voice contained more than a bit of reproval. "You did give away our shot at making fighters after all…"

"That was after I consulted the board at the time and they told me we had no chance of reviving the line on our own. We didn't have the engineers or the engine line to put a bird into the air unless you disagree?"

"Not really," Josaphine shrugged off his retort with little worry. "Our r and d is one area of concern we want to bring up with you, as in its more a couple of chair warmers then anyone with real engineering experience and the budget is barely enough for their salaries. Still begs the question, what do you want to do with the engines you've ordered?"

"Diplomacy," Andrew contained his wince at the three unimpressed looks he was getting as he said that. "Look the Excalibur class is nearly out of production; you have all heard about that? The GE 48000 drive system isn't being made anymore so you can't get it for love or money. Harry picked up on a rumor that the Dracs are using the GE 2080 drive for the Mule, and then started to wonder if we could get some concessions out of the Anduriens if we rescued their line."

"Jumbo's closer in tonnage than a Mule is… might work but you would need to do some tricky engineering to get everything right." Jin Slone spoke up for the first time. She was the firm's senior engineer so if anyone would know it would be her. "I really hope he's asking for an engineer exchange, or at least the right to hire some of Andurien Industries' engineers. We could use some new blood around here, our people are a bit too comfortable just doing rote refits on known designs."

I'll be sure to include that in my next message to him," Andrew frowned a bit as he heard the concern. "Would bringing in some new designs help any?"

"Unfortunately, not, most of our best end up working in the mining sector," Josaphine admitted with a grimace. "The lack of challenge and opportunity means we don't get the best at the moment. If you do manage to get production rights to anything we're going to need at least a decade before our engineering department is really up to snuff again. We've lost a lot of institutional knowledge over the years and there hasn't been the funds or will to rebuild it."

"I'm a little taken aback by that," Andrew admitted allowing confusion to show on his face. "Part of the reason why the family hasn't taken an interest in our aerospace holdings is that you, and your predecessors, haven't given us a reason to be interested. We've had steady returns and solid books for more than a century, rocking the boat seemed like a bad idea."

"Normally it is, and if you want us to keep on trucking there won't be any problems," Jin's soft voice was clear despite its lack of volume. "Our people know their designs and can do a lot with them… the problem is that while we turn a consistent profit there hasn't been much growth for a long time, and all of us would like to see that change. Harry taking an interest in transport, well, that gets our hopes up."

"Is there room for growth? I was under the impression that we were limited by technical issues," Andrew tried to think of an opportunity and came up blank. They made mostly civilian ships, with a single heavily outdated military design, actually, all of their offerings were to the minds of most nobles outdated.

"Possibly…" Josephine said cautiously.

"Oh, give it to him straight you old hag," Vernon barked out, clearly not in the mood to dance around the subject. "No ones making the Achilles in the suns anymore, so there's room for an assault dropship. We could fill that need with a modified Drost."

"Only after we trained up a proper engineering team and went through r and d with a flamethrower." Jin barked back, a sharp contrast to her earlier soft voice. "The engineering challenges won't be any easier just because we're working with a frame we're familiar with. Just running the power lines and ammo feeds would be a major job, getting it right would take planning that I don't have faith in the chair warmers to do right."

"Let's…" Josephine started to speak only to be overridden by Vernon who was up off his chair and looming over the smaller form of Jin.

"Only because we don't have the balls to make the attempt! The ideas have been out there for years but no ones pushed them. Yes, it will be a challenge, but it's not impossible! We aren't trying to make a new design, just adapt one we know well."

"We might as well be you, ignorant buffoon, in order to do the job we would have to strip the design down to its frame and engines, working up everything new out from there. That isn't a rebuild, it's practically a whole new design."

"PEOPLE!" Andrew raised his voice, cutting off the obviously long-running argument. "Thank you, might I remind you that you all work for me?"

"I've got a month before I retire," Vernon seemed to have kept his combative edge but he settled down a bit.

"And I look forward to that day if this is the way you act in a business meeting," Andrew warned flatly. "I'm not opposed to putting some money into this idea you have, but I want a solid plan before I even think about it. You've told me that no one in the Suns makes the Achilles, fair enough, so what has the Navy used to replace them? Is that satisfactory or is it just a stopgap? I need to know that before I can even begin to make a decision."

"We have contacts in the navy we can reach out to," Josephine seemed to realize that Andrew's temper was on edge after that display. "It will take longer then you're used to for us to find answers though. The navy works a little differently than you're used to, and getting ahold of people in the Department of Naval defense captains are mobile in a way that regiments aren't."

"Alright, get me some answers." Andrew turned to Jin and Vernon, favoring them with a frown. "The two of you? I want at least the beginnings of a paper study for this new assault ship. R and D aren't capable of that? Start firing people and don't hire chair warmers this time. Work together, or separately, I really don't care. Just get me something that indicates this is a viable option, even if it's for the future."

 

[GSpectre]

January 8th​ 3017
Foxes Den
New Avalon, Federated Suns

"Aaron it's good to see you again," Hanse greeted the lord of the Draconis march warmly. Unlike his relationship with Michael Hasek-Davion he got along with Aaron Sandoval, the two men had worked together frequently since Aaron had risen to command the Draconis March.

"My prince," Aaron bowed slightly. "You summoned me?"

"I did," Hanse acknowledged. "I have need of your expertise."

"Another stab at the dragon?" Aaron asked eagerly, his well-known hatred for the Kuritas and all their works showing on his face.

"Possibly, it depends on the situation on the ground as always." Hanse tried to gently keep Aaron from expressing yet another grandiose plan to do something like raid Luthien and burn Luthien Armor works to the ground. He had more limited goals in mind. "The war is winding down, everyone is too exhausted to make more than a single large push before we all need to begin rebuilding. I think we'll have the edge there, but the Dragon has surprised us before. In order to mitigate that I have an intelligence operation in the works, but success is not guaranteed. If it works, and unfortunately that is an if not a when we should have some flexibility on the Capellan border."

"So you want to push there?" Aaron cocked his head to the side with a slight frown. "I'm not seeing where I come into this."

"Because I don't know how successful we will be I want you to develop a couple of plans for me mostly using the resources of your march, not federal troops." Hanse indicated for Aaron to follow him over to the holo table which was already set up to display troop dispositions in the Draconis March.

"Much as I would like to heed the calls for liberation I hear coming from under the dragon's boots I can't do it on my own," Aaron disagreed with Hanse mildly. "Oh I could make some progress hitting under-defended worlds, but the cost wouldn't be worth it. Repairing my forces afterward would be the next best thing to impossible, and I'd need a lot of support to hold what I gained."

"I'm hoping to mitigate that for you," Hanse didn't like letting the cat out of the bag this early, reports were still sketchy about the success of the first phase of operation RELIANT, but he would need to if he wanted Aaron to cooperate. "If things go well I'm going to be moving two production lines worth of tooling to produce front-line quality equipment to Robinson Mech Works in the next year or two. I've spoken with Countess Jaffey and secured for you the plans and a license to build Awesomes as Robinson's first front-line offering, as well as a significant investment in Robinson by Lycomb-Davion Introtech to get your people over any problems they encounter."

"That's…" Aaron might have been a tanker during his own time in service but he was well aware of the power of Battlemechs, and the political implications of building an Assault Mech. Hanse was trying to sweeten the pot for him, which made him cautious. A successor lord didn't stay in power through sweetness and light, so for him to be making concessions like this meant he wasn't going to like the rest of this plan of his. "That would be helpful, Quentin is a bit exposed for my tastes, and it is our primary assault mech factory."

"Dieron district is a hard target, unfortunately, even if everything goes as planned that's not going to be the focus of my efforts," Hanse admitted.

"You want a stalking horse," Aaron accepted, although not easily.

"Not… Somewhat," Hanse admitted. "A lot is going to depend on other factors. What I would like for you and your command staff to do is come up with a variety of options." Hanse frowned as he looked over the map once again, still seeking a point where he could do the most good for the lowest investment in resources.

"I'm assuming that the plan using primarily Draconis March forces is the most likely to be used?"

"Yes. I'm going to be cutting orders for the light horses to launch an extended raiding campaign into the Galedon District as a distraction operation. I doubt they will do much damage, but it should tie up most of Warlord Aris Hansen's forces…"

"Your hoping internal politics get him?" Aaron asked with narrowed eyes. The current Warlord of the Galedon district was known to be disliked by the more traditional members of the nobility who served house Kurita. While his family was known for giving the dragon solid service, having provided several prefecture captains to the dragon over the years, the traditionalists disliked them. Not that the dislike had kept Aris from rising to warlord under Hohiro.

"He's flexible, which is a bad thing for us, and politically astute enough to have survived the purges that Takashi launched when he took power," Hanse answered obliquely. "I wouldn't be upset if someone less capable replaced him."

"A worthy goal, though I'm not sure how anything I could do would accomplish that…"

"I want you to take a look at widening our defensive depth around Marduk," Hanse said as he zoomed in on that region of space. "I doubt we could take Galtor, no matter how much I wish to. Tripoli and Paris? Might be possible."

"It would be a heavy lift," Aaron frowned as he looked at the map. "Especially with the Chisholm Raiders being moved out of my operations area… Yorioshi might be a traditionalist but he's not an idiot. That's going to create a meeting engagement, and the outcome is going to depend on who can feed their reinforcements into it faster."

"That's the idea," Hanse admitted. "I want everyone in the sphere convinced that I'm looking that way for my last push. I'll give you everything I can to win the fight, but it's not going to be my priority."

"Before I say yes," Aaron frowned as he looked at the map, shoving units around in his head as he tried to make it work. He would need to get with his staff, but it did on the face of it look like an offensive with achievable goals. "I need to know that whatever your true objective is, is worth the cost of blood."

Hanse was tempted to dissemble, his dream could easily be derailed by just a few loose lips after all. He didn't in the end though, if his enemies could hear his private discussions in the Foxes' den itself then he had already lost. Besides, Aaron had been critical to keeping Michael from even thinking about making a try at the first princes' title when Ian died. If anyone deserved to hear the truth then it was him.

"I think so," Hanse reluctantly began to lay out his plans. "Like I said we have an intelligence operation that should distract the Capellans. MIIO is hoping to poke Janos right in the pride, given what happened with his brother it shouldn't be too difficult to convince him to shift his focus away from the Lyran border. Depending on how he reacts we could see a major offensive from him against the Capellans, or just releasing the border province's forces to take targets of opportunity. We know the Capellans are already overstretched, their primary reserves are mercenaries after all, and with just a little more pressure coming towards them from the other border it opens up some opportunities."

"The far side of the confederation is hardly my focus, but I have to ask why do you think that just releasing the provincial forces will be enough?" Aaron asked mildly.

"Because even without support the Anduriens took Palladaine recently, and they managed to fight off the counterattack," Hanse answered promptly.

"That sounds logical, but I have to question how the idea is going to work out in the real world. I've heard a lot of plans from MIIO which turned out to be little more than hopes and dreams." Aaron pointed out pragmatically.

"If that's the case then I'm going to be bringing most of the corps of Davion Guards and the Marlette Crucis march militia in support of your operations," Hanse stated flatly. "I don't want you, or your staff, planning on that happening though."

Aaron narrowed his eyes and looked at the map once again. Hanse hadn't said directly what he intended, but given the forces, he had named... Aaron had a very good idea of what he was doing. Mentally he weighed his options before speaking, he had an idea of how to profit from Hanse's plans but there was a political cost there. Finally, he decided that it was worth it, besides better to get in on the ground floor rather than wait and need to fight with Michael Hasek-Davion.

"You're going to make a stab at Tikonov." Aaron's voice was distant as he continued to weigh the odds. "I'll order the Cartago DMM to support your offensive, but I want priority on the production. I'm going to need it."

"I can't give you an absolute priority," Hanse started to negotiate. "I can reserve a percentage for your use though."

Aaron started to argue and then stopped himself. He wasn't as conversant on the Capellan's industrial capacity as he was on the Draconis Combine, but a part of his march did border them so he was aware of at least the bare bones. Tikonov was the Capellan's largest mech production center, and it held at least part of their aerospace fighter production, even a fraction of that capacity when funneled into his march would allow him to rebuild his military. Especially given what was made there, Thunderbolts were an excellent mech, and the Quickdraw while hardly the most respected machine around was a sold counter to the fast heavies of the dragon. Aside from the benefits Aaron could see to his march in terms of production, the loss of the planet would be crippling to the confederation. It was an answer to Michael's complaints and would buy Hanse more than enough breathing room politically that he could support a real push against the Dragon.

"I can agree to that," Aaron said easily. His mind was already turning over the possibility, running through scenarios and seeing how to wrong-foot the dragon before he struck. "How long do I have before you start operations?"

"The earliest I can start would be at the end of this year, it's more likely that things will start heating up at the beginning of next year though. We need to wait for the reaction to my moves before we nail anything down, as it stands too much is up in the air. I'm not willing to just assume that things will go my way, so I want to wait until I see evidence of the Mariks moving before I commit."

"That makes sense…" Aaron looked over the map once again. "I presume you're going to begin stockpiling supplies and the like on Exeter?"

"I was thinking Layover, it's closer to Tikonov and Robinson so changing the direction of the thrust would be easier," Hanse's finger went through the holographic representation of the planet. He didn't want his supplies to end up in Aaron's hands by 'accident' should his maneuver pay off. Loyal as Aaron himself was a build-up of supplies in his march would be a target for diversion no matter what he said. Better not to put temptation in his way. "If fighting between the FWLM and the CCAF doesn't pick up then I can swing my battle group through Robinson and pick up the rangers there as reinforcements."

"They might not be there," Aaron said lightly. "I'll need to get with my staff before we make a decision though. Just off the top of my head, I think I can easily build up enough to push a front-line RCT backed up by a DMM one onto each of the targets. If I prime the 41st​ Avalon Hussars for a push on Proserpina it would give me an excuse to build up supplies for the Cartago DMM, but that's not going to be believable without you breaking out some of the more specialized units. The chemical damage there…"

"You're talking about reactivating at least part of the Plague Dogs," Hanse frowned as he said that. He really didn't like the message that would send.

"If we mean to keep the world, we're going to need their expertise at cleaning up chemical weapons releases. That and historically the last time we almost took that world the Dragon decided to open up with weapons of mass destruction."

"I'll think about it, but no guarantees." Hanse could see where Aaron was coming from, but his reservations remained. Perhaps if he moved a couple of dropships to New Avalon that would be believable without being threatening? He would have to go over the idea with his staff before he gave Aaron a definite answer. Given that Proserpina was sixty percent uninhabitable due to the chemical release some form of cleanup would need to be done on world, the Dragon certainly hadn't done anything to clean up after itself, but that could be handled with specialists using conventional transport. The specialized equipment of the Plague Dogs would be needed eventually if he intended to keep the world, but that needed to be weighed against the optics of having them deploy. Especially as part of an invasion force.

 

[GSpectre]

February 3rd​ 3017
Jojoken
Andurien, Free Worlds League

Mildred Humphreys was an unhappy camper as she navigated the almost deserted library looking for their, in her mind unwanted, guests. Harry Brockton seemed to have started living in this library almost as soon as he had set foot on world. Though why he would want to was something of a mystery, one she had ignored in favor of fighting to keep her position. A minor mystery of why a federated suns noble would be interested in the cultural archives of the Capellan Confederation was much less important to Mildred than regaining her position as the CO of the 6th​ Defenders.

Laurence had thrown her under the hover bus in his negotiations with the Captain-General, meaning that while she retained the rank of Colonel she was without a command. Mildred's best efforts hadn't been able to reverse that yet, though she had hope. Especially as the Falcons Nest battle group came closer to being operational. The Vengeance class carrier and her supporting ships had started life as a federal unit until they had defected to Anton during his ill-conceived attempt at the big chair. Even under the replevin doctrine, there was no way those ships were going to remain under Andurien command, no matter who they had surrendered to. Delaying her career as a sop to Janos was a pointless gesture, although her mother seemed to think that being without a command she could be shopped around on the marriage market.

The entire situation was infuriating, she had proven again and again that she had been correct to hold her battle group back on Calloway. Not even Sir Coker could disagree with her there, and he had gamed it out extensively rather than taking her word for it, the Orient loyal regiments had staked her command out for the wolves counting on the Defenders to gut the famous mercenaries in defeat making it possible for the three orient regiments to sweep in and destroy the damaged Anton loyalist commands. The blatantly political nature of their deployment should have been obvious to anyone with eyes to see, unfortunately for her, Janos didn't agree with her. He held her personally responsible for the damage that the Second Fusiliers had taken, probably the results of intense lobbying by the young Christopher Halas on behalf of his father, and had seemingly taken great pleasure in trying to destroy her career.

Pushing that thought aside she sited her prey and paused to straighten her cream-colored uniform. Harry Brockton was bent over a book of occupation-era poetry, an unusual choice and she wondered if he could even read it. Before Ursula Liao's reforms Terrence Liao had mandated that the Andurien people use Capellan mandrin transliterated into Cyrillic characters as a means to deny Anduriens the dubious benefits of Capellan citizenship.

"Finding anything interesting?" Mildred inquired mildly, surprisingly enough Harry didn't start in surprise. She had known he was a mech jock, but this was the first sign of it she had seen so far in her interactions with him. He was clearly used to processing information gleaned from the corners of his eyes, a valuable skill when one read the three-hundred-and-sixty-degree compressed panoramic display of a mech.

"Confusing is more like it Colonel," Harry answered not looking up from his book. "Trying to read this is an exercise in frustration, and I'm fluent in Mandarin. Why anyone felt the need to transliterate Mandarin into Cyrillic is beyond me. As it stands I can barely make my way through this, and I'm left wondering just what about this was culturally valuable enough for it to be presented to the lords of the star league as an example of the civilizing effects of Capellan culture."

"It's dreck isn't it?" Mildred felt the corners of her mouth curve up into a slight grin. "Have you tried the resistance poetry?"

"While I'm fluent in several languages, Italian isn't one of them," Harry admitted freely, finally looking up from his book. "Are they any good? The Taurian genre with the same name isonly slightly better than what I've been wading through."

"Not appreciably, Anduriens tend to be more hands-on. The Castra Nostra saw its greatest period of growth under the occupation, an issue that we're still dealing with to this day." Mildred shrugged as she said that. "Any particular reason you're torturing yourself with this merda?"

"Trying to understand what was going on with the Confederation in the time period. Terrence I understand, Ursula? She confuses me a bit. Her actions make little sense in the context of the time, and she was the one who promoted this…" Harry's hands made a throwing away gesture.

"She was a Liao," Mildred replied bluntly, expressing all of her care for that family.

"She was half Terran," Harry corrected gently. "Considering just what the other Terran family which ended up on a national throne got up to… probably a good thing she didn't procreate."

"If only the rest of her benighted family would follow her sterling example," Mildred was lost for a second in that fantasy. It was pleasant but reminded her once again why she had tracked down Harry. "My mother would be pleased to extend an invitation for you to visit the dark tower at the end of the week, privately."

"I suppose that explains why she's having you run around as an errand girl," Harry nodded his understanding. "If I can ask, your thoughts on our offer?"

"It's fare, but I don't think you're going to be getting what you want. The Dame guards those specifications closer than she does her own children." Mildred couldn't help but let at least a little bitterness leach into her voice. Her mother had a tendency to use her children like chess pieces, to their detriment, a fate she had been successfully avoiding before her career had foundered on the rocks of Jano's spite. "It would certainly be helpful to us to produce the Excalibur again."

"The defenders are one of the most vehicle-heavy formations on the FWLM's order of battle," Harry agreed, pointedly ignoring the bitter note in Mildred's voice. "You're almost as bad as us Feddies about bringing along vehicles."

"Don't use them like you do though," Mildred pointed out, she was beginning to enjoy this conversation. "We fence with ours, though that might be the composition of what we get. Most of our heavies are Onto's, and they aren't that common."

"You do seem to favor speedier vehicles, though why in the world you keep buying Harassers armed with SRMs instead of throwing a decent LRM system on them I have no idea," Harry's voice was filled with disdain at that choice.

"We have LTV-4s as a long-range option, and there's value to swinging up behind a heavier Lyran formation with SRM spam," Mildred defended her nation's vehicle choice with the ease of long practice. "With the Capellans it's all dirty tricks in back alleys, very little upfront fighting. Even when you are fighting them straight up it's usually home guards and all they have are Vendettas and Scorpions backed up by the occasional Brutus. The Harasser works really well turning them into bunkers if we don't go with the flambe option."

"Wouldn't work against the dracs, they tend to come at you with the heavier end of the hover spectrum." Harry shrugged. "That's a nightmare to face."

"I imagine so, you saw a lot of action while you were in?"

"I was with the prince at Halstead Station," Harry's voice took a far-off tone as he said that, his eyes unfocusing as if lost in his memory. "The regulars and hussars weren't too bad. 9th​ Dieron was annoying, way too many cavalry heavies. 2nd​ Proserpina Hussars were a treat though, for all their airs they had way too many lights filling in the ranks. Getting into a fight with them was a great way to run up your kill count. Then you have the Steel Dragon, they were a nightmare. Well-trained, and as heavy as you would want. We struggled against them, though we covered the Prince in the end. Yorinaga Kurita wanted a second Davion scalp badly, bastard pushed hard."

"Can't say my enemies have had quite that pedigree," Mildred admitted lightly, watching closely for signs that Harry had soldiers shock. He seemed to snap back to himself easily enough, so she doubted it, but with veterans, it was always a worry. "Wolfs Dragoons weren't fun, but that was more political than a real fight on my end."

"Orient tried to screw you, from what I heard at least," Harry's voice was sympathetic.

"Not that surprising, despite all my lobbying the Dame has kept the 6th​ at home. We don't have the reputation that the 5th​ has, so we looked like an easy target to score some cheap points off of." Mildred admitted grumpily. "Hell, we didn't even get in on Palladaine."

"I wouldn't worry too much about your time on the bench, Dame Catherine isn't going to be able to afford to keep you there no matter what Janos wants," Harry commented as he began to pile up the books he had been reading. "What do you think she's going to offer me instead of what I want?"

"Money, lots of it," Mildred was intrigued by the certainty in Harry's voice, she had to wonder just what he knew that she didn't.

"She can't afford it, not if she's smart. I've yet to see any indications that she isn't so I'm going to keep with my assumption that she's buying mercenary contracts like it's going out of style, meaning her cash reserves are low." Harry's tone was absolutely confident on that point.

"What makes you so certain that there's going to be a war here?" Mildred asked with narrowed eyes. She hadn't seen any indication that Harry was correct, despite being in semi disgrace she was still in high command and hadn't heard anything about the dutchy hiring new mercenaries. Beyond the usual small unit churn that was.

"Janos temper and the way the Liao's operate," Harry turned to face her squarely. "You heard Candice's announcement that they're bringing back the FireBee?"

"Yes, I looked up the specs on that and then had a laugh. Our Hermes II's will eat them for lunch at range." Mildred hadn't been worried about that announcement the thirty-five tonner was hardly a threat. It could be dangerous under the right circumstances, especially to vehicles, but with a bit of tactical knowledge, its threat was severely diminished.

"Heard anything about a hero project to produce the tooling?"

"No…" Mildred frowned at that. Her mind turning over the implications. "We assumed that they had restored some of their older sets of tooling."

"I wouldn't the Capellans have been struggling in terms of production for a long time. They prettied it up, but there's a reason why they didn't adopt militia mechs like everyone else did. Their production numbers have been dropping worse then ours have, and we're one of the weaker states in terms of industrial capacity."

"But they did announce it, officially that is," Mildred felt her eyes narrow. The Capellans, much as she looked down on them, were good at fulfilling the promise of announced programs. They would fuck up in terms of production numbers, often well below the targets set on Sian, but when they said they were producing something it was getting produced even if they had to hand-build one a year.

"Exactly. The Celestial throne said they were going to be doing that, so it will get done. It's not like the various infrastructure programs that the planetary governments slap the hero project label on." Harry almost sneered as he said that. The Capellans were notorious for blowing up their own industry if it was threatened rather than letting it fall into enemy hands. Then they would half-ass at best the rebuild, leaving the planetary government in charge only for the Liao's to sweep in and take the credit if the rebuild was successful.

"You think Janos made a mistake, announcing our success like he did?" Mildred cocked her head to the side as she said that, interested in hearing an outsider's take on the issue. There had been more than a few debates on what Janos had done, mostly on the best way to attack him politically, but those had all been informed by the Andurien distaste for federal authority.

"Possibly," Harry paused and frowned as he tried to put his thoughts into words. "Revitalizing industrial production is a mark of a successful leader, though in this case, I think Janos jumped the gun due to his political weakness. He should have held off until the machinery was delivered and installed before announcing his success as the Lyrans did with Mountain Wolf. Going public as early as he did was an engraved invitation for the Capellans."

"I'm not sure it was," Mildred replied evenly. She knew more about the project than she should have due to her family's connection to Sigmund Hughes, a rising star in Iran he had been recalled from Shiro III to rebuild their production lines after Anton's troops had thrown a tantrum. Her mother had thrown her weight behind him, even going so far as to get outside help from somewhere to ensure he succeeded. It wasn't just because Mildred's little sister was infatuated with the man. Sigmund had been deeply involved in the initial push to develop new production equipment for a two-forty engine and gyro, a project left over from his predecessor who had been hoping to expand the Iran Shiro III production site. With most of Iran's resources tied up at the moment in rebuilding the funds hadn't been available to expand, leading to the Mariks stepping in and taking over the project. "The driving political reason for the Liberator announcement came from the Lyran border, their new model Commandos have been giving the FWLM fits."

"Hermes II is a solid counter to the new Commandos, as are the Spiders, from what I've read about the Liberator its best use would be to counter the Capellans," Harry disagreed. "Unless it was a smoke screen for another project?"

"That would be telling," Mildred smirked as she said that.

"Either way the announcement was a mistake, not in and of itself, but by responding to concerns on the Lyran border by revealing something that anyone with minimal intelligence can see is primarily aimed at the Capellans after failing to respond to their instigation of a civil war effectively… Janos said he didn't care about the Capellan border, and Max can do what he likes without drawing a response," Harry paused there checking to see if Mildred was following his reasoning. Given her tightening lips he thought she was. "If Janos had responded to Anton's treason with more force it would be one thing, but he didn't. That's why I think he made a mistake, the Capellans are going to run a cost-benefit analysis and come to the conclusion that there isn't going to be enough of a response to make the theft not worth it."

"I take it you disagree."

"I do, Orient and Orloff will be on the warpath along with Marik," Harry grinned as he said that. "You are already pushing for something to be done about the Capellans, and that's a block of political power that Janos can't ignore. My bet is Janos is going to overcompensate to make up for the perceived mistake, do you disagree?"

"Looking at it like that I can't," Mildred tried to dispute Harry in her mind but she couldn't disagree. Especially with how weak the Capellans were looking after their loss of Palladaine. She would need to talk with her mother soon because this sounded like a golden opportunity for Andurien. Perhaps she could use it to get herself back in command? Something to think on for the future at least.

 

[GSpectre]

February 9th​ 3017
The Dark Tower, Jojoken
Andurien, Free Worlds League

"Much as I like the idea of gaining control over Andurien Industries, my worry is the length of the trade route and its stability. While the Suns and us in the League haven't come to blows recently, going through the Terran corridor is an inherently risky thing to do." Catherine Humphreys had been a bit surprised that Brenda Brockton hadn't taken the lead in the negotiations. She had thought that she would be dealing with the older woman, rather than her son. It wasn't that the son was completely hopeless so much as from what her spies could tell her he had been in the background of any negotiations concluded in the Commonwealth. Perhaps this was Brenda's way of pushing him forward as a possible husband for Mildred? It had been on a whim she had her daughter fetch the young man, but to her mind it would be a good match. Especially given just how toxic Janos had made Mildred recently, getting her out of the League would be to the girls benefit, not that she could see it at the moment, the girl was far too fixated on her hurt pride and lost command to take advantage of the opportunities in front of her. Something that Catherine would need to have words with her about, but that was a thought for the future.

"It is an established route, your grace," Harry managed to keep his frustration contained, barely, the Dame of Andurien was turning out to be a vexing negotiator. For every point he raised she had multiple objections, even when she was clearly interested.

"To the League, it is, but through the League itself? I don't think I need to remind you of our favorite sport here," Catherine gave a small smile as she raised the League's infamous instability. Having any of her supply lines running that way would not be conducive to her plans, especially not something that could turn out to be as valuable as dropship engines. Using the stereotype that of it always being civil war o'clock in the League pleased her, and if things went the way she wanted them to could very well give her the opening in Crimson she had been looking for.

"Do you have an alternate suggestion?" Harry inquired mildly.

"Between the two families, we have excellent relations in the periphery. Your own family has done a surprising amount of business with Samantha, and I don't think I need to tell you about my own family's connections to Crimson." Catherine stated blandly. "Being from the Outback I'm sure that you can think of multiple ways that a new trade route could benefit your people, rather than having it run through the Suns interior."

"That would be a hard sell in Samantha, while Zarantha was open to the idea of cooperation with a known quantity in the Suns Thomas is more reserved." Harry cautioned. "I don't dislike the idea especially if we can anchor one end of the proposed route in Basantapur, using the continued goodwill that the former UHC worlds have with the Concordat, but we would need to include a hefty package of inducements before Thomas would be willing to bite."

"I had thought you had better relations with him," Catherine observed mildly. "Certainly, your man signore Azad managed to get him to approve exporting one-sixty rated engines into the Suns…"

"I didn't say that it was impossible, just difficult," Harry temporized. He had known his family had been trying to get engines out of several sources due to his father's letters, but their success or failure hadn't been included. "We aren't going to need to overcome just the bad blood between the Suns and the Concordat, but also the resentment that the Magistracy has for the Concordat."

"I wouldn't worry about that my dear," Catherine smirked contemplating just what she would need to get Kyalla to approve. It wouldn't be much, just a few seats at Humphreys would do it. Kyalla had been looking to improve her military for a long time, going so far as to waive the purchase price for those seeking commissions if they had graduated from an accredited academy. It hadn't been a hugely successful program so far, but that was more due to the only takers having only managed to get into one of the Hero Institutes rather than a more respectable institution. Letting Kyalla grant a few of her favored family's seats at Humphreys would sure up her political support and give Catherine a greater in with the MAF in the long term. Ties of tradition were nice, but they faded over time unless you spent the effort to maintain them. "Herotitus is already used as a go-between for trade between the two, and beefing up that route would be much easier than establishing something new."

"And you already have an existing route with Canopus," Harry frowned as he thought about the deal and what would be required from his end to fulfill it. Catherine had honestly out-maneuvered him here, she wouldn't just be getting a connection with the suns, but a direct connection with the Concordat. Given the misgivings that Thomas had about dealing with the Suns, he would be delighted with the prospect of having a major alternate buyer lined up for his excess military production, beyond the Liaos. The mercenary market had been good to the Concordat, but it could be inconsistent at times, and the Liaos had the unfortunate habit of being just as bad as the Suns about raiding although they did have better publicity in the Concordat. Harry knew his father had hoped that with a lot of effort, they could turn Trevlu into a recognized reseller of Taurian mechs in the Suns, but if Thomas had a choice that wasn't likely to happen. Then again…

Harry looked around the sumptuously appointed room that Catherine had chosen for this meeting. It was a testament to the wealth of Andurien, with pieces of art from all of the successor states hanging on the walls. While they could be war prizes, if he was honest with himself, he thought it more likely that they were the rewards for trading well. A statement of power as it were, playing off the league's reputation as an entrepôt for trade, and indicating that the Anduriens were good at that sort of game despite their stellar position. It was something that Harry found he wanted for Brockton, they were a wealthy system for the outback, but hardly competing with one of the golden five or even some of the interior Crucis march worlds. The critical words in that phrase were 'for the outback' something that generations of Brockton's had tried to change.

"If we can get an agreement out of Samantha, I am more than open to the idea," Harry stated cautiously. "I would need reassurances that you are invested in the idea though. My family may be wealthy, but we are hardly in the same class as your own."

"But you do produce military hardware, a growth business," Catherine could see that Harry was on the hook. Now all she needed to do was reel him in.

"A necessary bit of diversification," Harry corrected the grand old dame his mind racing for ways to get her to commit firmly to the deal. "The primary driver of our economy has always been our extensive Biotech industry, which has been in decline for centuries as new colonization efforts are a dead letter, and bioengineered crops have been deemed too expensive despite their obvious advantages. Perhaps you would be interested in our scientist's services?"

"For new colonization efforts?" Catherine barely managed to keep the disdain out of her voice. Colonies were a fool's game, expensive pits to sink money into with only a fraction of a percent ever surviving long enough to produce even the slightest bit of revenue.

"Recolonization I would think, you do have nineteen dead systems within a two-jump radius." Harry pointed out mildly. "While recovering systems from the Confederation might be satisfying how many have you managed to keep in the Dutchy? Besides, it's an area you are going to need to look into soonish, depending on when you intend to take Sigma Mare."

That statement caused Catherine to freeze for an instant. She had thought that her plans to push back the border and invest Betelgeuse had only been known to her closest associates. Mildred hadn't even known about them, so Harry hadn't learned about them during his rather extensive talks with the girl. He was probably just stabbing in the dark for any advantage that he could find, although she could use this.

"What makes you think I'm going to attack there?"

"Betelgeuse isn't a soft target, you're going to want to draw down the reaction forces the Confederation has available before you go after it." Harry shrugged slightly as he talked. "It might not be your first target, but it has to be on your list. You've pushed back the border consistently, so I can't see you not taking a stab at it eventually."

"And what makes you think I'll need biotech expertise if I do go after the system?"

"Unless you want it to be twenty dead systems within two jumps?" Harry contained his smirk as he played off the Dame's contempt for the Capellans. "It's a system with known problems dating back to the days of the Star League, which is why the Capellans put their terraforming research on world. We might not have the reputation that the department of colonization had, but we keep an eye on our competitors in the biotech sector. Obviously, the Capellans aren't very good at it, given the number of failed colonies in this region of space… meaning that the Dutchy is going to have to step in with extensive support to keep the system alive. Unless I miss my guess, you don't have the knowledge you need to fix the Capellans' errors otherwise you already would have."

"And you do have this knowledge?" Catherine asked with a raised eyebrow. Internally her mind was racing, she had known that Sigma Mare was a troubled system but it sounded like there was more trouble there than she had known about. Her original plan of just pulling at least part of the population off world to reduce the overcrowding might not work, then again perhaps she could adjust. If she set up an investment brokerage to cover the costs of any recovered colonies, she could get buy-in from the local system governments. If her lawyers worked their magic the correct way the money planetary governments invested could be written off as losses reducing the federal tax burden, especially if she reduced the provincial taxes to match, thereby keeping more of the province ineligible to take advantage of Camlann. If the financial structure was right it would be possible to have any profits go directly to the province in leu of provincial taxes, further depreciating the federal taxes paid, while pleasing the planetary governments as they would have more income to spend while still reaping the benefits of being a province member. It was an intriguing idea, though one she would need to have looked over by both her own personal lawyers and those who were part of the provincial administration.

"I won't say we could help you recover everything," Harry said, making sure to keep his promises modest. "From what I've heard we have a very good shot at returning Tengil, Kalmar, and Borka to your rule. I would want some extensive survey work done before I could promise anything solid, that said their loss is relatively recent and probably had to do with the Capellans cutting corners where they shouldn't have."

"That's an interesting suggestion," Catherine didn't betray just how interesting she found the possibilities. "But perhaps we should come back to the point?"

"I rather thought that was part of the point," Harry grinned slightly. "There are benefits to us both should we work out a support structure for the proposed trade route. I do not doubt that you have similar hidden depths in your economy we could benefit from. Besides, the Far Lookers political movement in the Concordat would be very interested in anything you do in regards to colonization, and having them on board would make setting everything up far easier in Samantha."

"That young man is a solid hit," Catherine had to smile at that. Harry Brockton was turning out to be an interesting young man, and not completely out of his depths politically. His efforts to dangle just enough bate that she would end up bearing the primary cost of setting up the trade route was an interesting move, but not one she objected to. Given his family's position, it would be worth pushing Mildred to express more interested in him personally, directly that was. He seemed to be at least somewhat interested in her, but Mildred appeared to have missed the ques. Between her cousin on Gibson and Louise's thoroughly inappropriate pursuit of Sigmund Hughes she already had greater access to military hardware than even SAFE realized. Given her ambitions, a little more wouldn't hurt though, especially if it came at such a cheap price. Good colonels were a dime a dozen, connections to battlemech producers were much rarer, and if she decided to tie the Brockton family to her own through blood it was a two for one deal. She would get favorable treatment with the Suns-based Trevlu, and by maintaining her connection to them she would also get preferential access to the Concordats industry. Getting behind Brenda's idea and pushing might very well be worth the political cost of having a family member marry outside of the League.

 

[GSpectre]

February 15th​ 3017
Trevlu Mechworks
Brockton, Federated Suns

"As you can see our production capacity isn't limited by space, but rather by machine tooling. We still have two additional sites which were stripped of machinery back in the second succession war, given they were dug out of the Captains mountain range and been maintained in the hopes of reactivating them someday…" Andrew broke off with a shrug, which almost tilted the damned safety helmet he was wearing off his head. If he could have gotten away with it he would have worn his old infantry helmet, but its lack of hi-viz markings made it inappropriate. Instead, he was stuck with one of the loaner helmets meant for visitors, just like his companion.

"So you do have the space, that was a concern back on New Avalon," David Sanromea-Davion spoke softly. A well put together man, his dapper appearance was not the picture of marital glory a usual Davion noble presented. Between his soft voice and unassuming appearance you would think you were talking with an accountant, not a Duke in charge of one of the closest planets to New Avalon. "I see you have the production lines running overtime at the moment, and if I'm not mistaken you recently switched over from Icarus to swordsmen on one of the lines?"

"Five percent over list for the next decade on a guaranteed contract from the First Prince." Andrew agreed with a grin. "Between the distaste, we have for Corean products on world, and the commonality of parts, it was an easy decision to make. I almost gave the order to switch over the Whitworth line as well, but that was a bridge too far for the board. It's a steady earner and it hasn't earned the contempt of our Mechwarrior community… so the financials weren't there."

"Interesting," David said mildly as he was led into the soundproofed break room. With it being the middle of the shift there was no one present and it was the best place for the two men to talk.

"So," Andrew led off giving the other duke a sideways look. "What are you really here for? Hanse Davion isn't an idiot, and sending the head of the largest banking conglomerate all the way out here with no warning when we haven't asked for a loan isn't a smart move."

"I was warned you were more perceptive than you choose to appear." David smiled slightly. "Thank you for the compliment, my family is often overlooked, despite our sterling service. Too Lyran I believe the popular perception is."

"Something I've been accused of being myself from time to time," Andrew answered while waiting for his answer.

"Ah, but you served in the AFFS, in infantry granted, but you did serve. My own family has traditionally been civil service, despite our name." David showed a bit of his research. The duke of Brockton was a bit hard to pin down, his service jacket and industrialist ambitions not matching what one thought of as a traditional noble. Very few nobles who were mech qualified, and had the means to procure a mech, would willingly serve in another branch. "As for why I'm here… Your family built that, didn't they? Those aren't recovered lines; I've been around enough of them to tell. Everything's too new, and you're using manpower instead of computer controls."

"It wasn't easy, and what we have is limited, but yes." Andrew favored the other duke with a frown as he said that. "I didn't realize it was that obvious."

"Not to a layman, but I've been involved in financing several retooling and expansion projects. After the snow job Starcorps ran on me I took the time to learn what I needed." David didn't let on just how annoyed he remained over that project even two decades after the fact. StarCorps Crofton had taken him for a ride, promising to bring back Warhammer production only to switch gears and increase the number of militia-grade Longbows once they had the financing. It hadn't hit the bank's bottom line, but it had hit his reputation. He had promised to improve the Suns abysmal heavy mech production only to fail publicly.

"Still looking for heavys? You would have better luck over in our Basantapur location. Prakash Azad and his team are working on modifying the Crossbow into a heavy brawler, and taking less time than they swore they would need." Andrew grinned as he said that. The MacEnroe database had turned out to be a godsend on that project. The six-cee version had the shoulder assemblies needed for their modification already on file, cutting the time needed to produce a prototype in half.

"I'm well aware of that, you cannot hide the effort that Trevlu is making in preparation, which brings me back to why I'm here. You're providing myomer looms and bone builders," David used the colloquial term for the machines which built a battlemechs internal structure easily, once again showing his familiarity with the engineering involved in battlemech production. "All of which are rated to produce a heavy mech. The question I have for you is can you do it for something heavier than sixty tons?"

"As long as I have the specifications, yes. My people can do it, though it may take us a little longer than we would like. Actuators, Electronics, engines, and Gyros… machines to build those components would take us a very long time. We struggle with the precision needed to produce the former, and our electronics industry isn't up to the latter. If we could get our hands on examples… then I would have a very different answer for you. Unfortunately, those sorts of machine tools aren't available to us for love or money," Andrew carefully didn't show how much his son's rejection in the Commonwealth had stung. He had expected it from the local nobility, but for it to come up clear across the sphere? That was insulting to an extreme degree, and he would remember the insult.

"Very good," David grinned like a satisfied cat as he said that. He was pleased to see the duke was living up to his reputation of being a relatively straight shooter. As part of his research for this trip he had reached out to several families who had worked with the duke in the past, and they had all said the same thing. The Gargs had been clear about what he would and wouldn't do, and surprisingly enough several of the smaller families who had gone through him to buy mechs from the Concordat had said the same thing. It was unusual for a man of his resources to be so careful about his reputation in business dealings, never over-promising and delivering almost without fail. Now he just had to put that carefully cultivated reputation to the test. "It seems your sons words to the First Prince were taken to heart, he's putting his weight behind getting Achenar back into the heavy mech game. Between lending them the expertise of his newest mercenary hires, a doctor Banzai, and letting them have access to NAIS resources we believe they will have a workable prototype of a front-line Battleaxe shortly. The question is where to get the machine tools to produce it."

"Seventy tons? Doable." Andrew nodded firmly. "For the bone makers, it's a question of programming, just setting them up to add a few layers and tighten the spacing. Myomer weavers and extruders, we have the plans on file."

"Trevlu makes a militia-grade version doesn't it?" David was quietly cursing himself for forgetting that fact. It was obvious in hindsight but he hadn't been reminded of it during his tour. The Brockton plant was geared exclusively towards medium mechs, which was why it had slipped his mind.

"We do, though I would need to see the specifications before I would authorize us even thinking about upgrading our plants to produce a front-line version. The original was way too much of a heat hog and too lightly armored for me to be comfortable offering it under our name. Achenar can survive the reputational hit of putting out a bad mech, we can't."

"Your son seemed to think it was acceptable?" David asked, cocking his head to the side.

"It will get the job done, I just think our Crossbow is going to be better. That I really don't want to start messing around figuring out how to produce PPCs at the moment. We've got some heavy financial commitments and overstretching that way would be inviting an attack."

"Corean… I see…" David nodded his understanding. "Could you produce the needed machines and produce enough to set up a Crossbow line here?"

"A longer production run is possible," Andrew narrowed his eyes in evaluation. "I'm not sure it would be advisable though. Going off the top of my head we would need to push any order we got from Achenar back by at least six months if we did that. Not to mention…"

"I'm authorized to provide financing for any such expansion you undertake at one percent interest on a single line," David said blandly, enjoying the shock on Andrew's face. "In confidence, the First Prince believes he has found a source for the machine tools you do not make at this time, though it will take time to see if he is correct in his assessment."

"And should this mysterious source fall through?"

"The loans will be contingent on delivery of the missing tooling. Should those fail to surface then the debt will be assumed by the Davion trust." David continued in his blandest voice. "Naturally such a consideration should be reflected in the pricing of your offer to Achenar."

Andrew nodded in understanding. The First Prince was willing to help out, but he wanted his share of the pie. Not an unreasonable request, and certainly something he could accommodate relatively easily. The heavy machinery division wouldn't complain, even if they had to eat a bit of their own profits on this run. If Hanse came through then they would be very well positioned to cover the gaps in their knowledge base and jump from limited capability all the way up to a true tooling manufacturer.

"I would need to speak with my accounting department, and the legal team, but this sounds like something I can agree to in principle." Andrew mentally lined up just who he would need to speak with, and how fast he could get it done.

"This is close hold, so please be discrete," David gently prodded the other duke.

"If the people I need to talk to aren't closed-mouthed then they would have been fired a long time ago," Andrew said with complete confidence. "Although, I have to ask, how did you know so much about what Harry said to the first prince? It wasn't in the social papers beyond the usual tittering about the social faux pas of an outback noble."

"My daughter," David's voice was filled with a mix of paternal pride and frustration which Andrew knew all too well. "She chose not to follow me into the family business and has ambitions of being the next Dana Stephenson."

"You have my condolences there," Andrew had to wince in sympathy. There was setting your sites on the attainable, and then shooting for the moon. It sounded like David's daughter had decided that the moon was a better target. "I presume she is with the Guards at the moment?"

"A captain with the fourth, but she is tipped to be promoted to major and take command of the second battalion of the third," David couldn't help but boast, He was proud of his little girl and completely unashamed of that pride. Although he did wish she had gone into logistics, or some other rear area post. That was after all one of the traditional ways for a noble to join the business community, assuming they didn't go for the civil service option that is.

"Impressive, she's done well for herself."

 

[GSpectre]

March 4th​ 3017
The Eyrie
Wendigo, Free Worlds League

Janos Marik knew he was a tired old man, his triumphs long behind him, and all that remained was a long slow slide into irrelevance. No matter what he told his supporters he was all too aware of that truth, and that he had buried the best parts of his legacy. His devotion to duty drove him on, powered by his desire to piss on the graves of every fool who had torn down what he had accomplished at the beginning of his reign. That desire was why he was here, rather than on the planet below warm in his bed.

Martin, his heir, joined him looking out the window at the small dot of Atreus below. While Janos trusted the boy's political instincts the way he ran around acting like a fop rubbed the older man the wrong way. Especially after what had happened to Faith. Martin knew how to use the image, and was smart enough to keep it to just an image rather than reality, thank god. The last thing Janos needed was another one of his children turning into junkies.

"What bad news does William have for us today?" Martin asked his usual boyish charm in ambiance, replaced with the hard face of a Marik. Janos couldn't help but smirk in approval over the change, no matter what parliament thought they were getting with the boy he would run rings around those fools, a good legacy to leave behind when his time came.

"Rumblings from Loyalty," William Cornejo stated flatly, "And an update on just what the Dragon has been getting up to."

"Not the fed rats, crappies, or liars?" Janos asked, indulging in the lack of witnesses to freely use the pejoratives that usually stayed in his head when he had to think about the other successor states.

"We know what the Lyrans are up to, they announced it after all. A triumph of Lyran engineering and ingenuity I believe the press release called it," Martin snorted as he said that. "As if getting an old mercenary stopgap into production is something to be proud of."

"It's the production that they're proud of," Janos disagreed with his heir. "Liars they may be, but they build better than anyone else. Never forget that fact, or it will bite you in the ass when you least expect it."

"I know," Martin frowned a bit. "The Humphreys are just as bad, we were supposed to be impressed by rocket launchers?"

"Let the poisonous bitch crow all she likes," Janoses voice was sour. "She won't be crowing for long when Kali Yama comes through for us, she'll be begging for favors just like the rest of the opposition soon enough."

"That might not happen," William spoke up, refusing to wilt from the poisonous glares he got from the two Mariks. It was times like this when he was firmly reminded of their blood relation.

"Explain," Janos stated flatly.

"We had a bit of a situation develop on Loyalty when the production equipment was loaded. Two teams tried to hijack the shipment. The first reports are we got them all, but I don't trust the commander on the ground. He let a team of death commandos get all too close to succeeding, if they hadn't run into a DEST team trying for the same objective which we had no clue was on world then they very well might have."

"I suppose you're going to argue for mercy for the son of a bitch?" Janos had his temper on full display now.

"No," William stated flatly. "All four ships made it to the Ire without reporting issues, but if she disappears…"

"You aren't worried about a naval interception?" Martin asked mildly.

"Ire's ex-SLDF, one of their special rapid reaction jobs. She's been kept in excellent shape since then with parts directly from her manufacturer, once she jumps out there isn't a ship in the sphere that can catch her, and she's using one of three alternate routes through dead or never settled systems to get to her destination. She was specifically chosen for this job because of her capabilities. The only threat to her is going to be internal." William asserted with absolute confidence. "She might not have the battery she had back in the day, but with her expanded bunkerage she's perfect for slipping in and out of other states without notice and getting deep into their backfields. The Eagle Corps usually uses her for deep raids, so we know the crew is loyal."

"Options?" Janos said flatly.

"Kali Yama has a backup plan in place, but you're going to need to modify the acceptable specifications. If they use the Nissan two hundred they already produce the Liberator will begin production on schedule, but it will lose about ten kilometers an hour off the top speed." Martin spoke firmly. He had been up to his neck in getting the Liberator project off the ground, mostly in clearing away political objections and smoothing over ruffled feathers. Irian had been a particularly thorny issue, with his cousin Garth being more of a blockhead than usual. "That might not make the LCCC happy, but it will calm some of the objections we'd likely get from Irian and Andurien. They've been worried we're planning to replace the Hermes II outright, especially after Anton's temper tantrum."

"They didn't sell you a pig in a poke, did they? It works?"

"It's the original design before they were forced to redesign by the LCCC, frankly I think that the rumors we were hearing about there being unreported issues were Kali Yama trying to get the design changed back so they could deliver on schedule. You know they've been fighting with the cooling system due to the torso design." Martin shrugged before continuing in a light voice. "Yes, they're all minor issues that won't push back deployment, according to them, but they've been going full throttle with the alternate design in parallel which makes me think the issues were more severe than we were led to believe."

"And you didn't think to say anything?"

"What did we have to lose? They failed, we foreclosed on the loans, and shock… put out their alternate design due to the leadership of the Marik. They succeeded? We have a new mech. Either way, we win."

"Planning to put yourself in charge of the project?" Janos's suspicious mind was fully engaged now.

"No, I was thinking of having Duggan do it. Having him in charge of shooting a few of his industrialist friends might just convince the rest of that venial lot he's not the safest favor trader around. Lord knows he's not going to moderate himself." Martin grimaced as he said that. He liked his younger brother, but there were times when he just wanted to throttle him. His incessant favor trading and backhanders were a problem, one that he would have to deal with in time.

"I'll keep that in mind," Janos kept his opinion firmly to himself on Duggan. The boy was a disappointment, wallowing in Lyran-style corruption and hedonism even if he did do his duty when required. "William, you said you had some additional information about the Dragon?"

"One of their new developments was transported through a chain we were aware of," Willaim's grin was downright predatory as he said that. It was a quirk of the mans that he reveled in SAFE's abysmal reputation, leaking stories to enhance it with glee. The truth of the matter was that SAFE's expertise was in finding and breaking into enemy communication loops, something they were frighteningly good at, with a side order of plain old bribery. "For some odd reason, they choose to run their courier through one of the local nobles who was hosting a Tai-sa of the Twenty-Fifth Rasalhague Regulars who made the mistake of announcing his war crimes to the Lyrans. LOKI somehow got the plans for the estate… and well, did what they always do. Naturally, the courier escaped, and through a bit of daring defected, bringing the data with him."

"Well done," Janos couldn't help but smirk at that. It was always a pleasure to give the liars a hand hoisting themselves on their own petards. "We did we get?"

"Specifications for the Dragon's newest weapon, a lighter PPC," William accepted the scant praise with grace, he had worked with Janos long enough to learn the old man's foibles well. One of his faults was an almost congenital inability to give fulsome praise, no matter how pleased he was. "If we can get it to work it would be a boon to Irian, their Hermes II is almost the perfect platform for the system, assuming what we got wasn't intended as disinformation."

"A PPC, lovely," Martin frowned and chewed his lips as he considered what to do with the information. Unlike his father, he could let a grudge go, and that might be required here. There were very few PPC manufacturers in the League, the weapon was almost extinct here despite the family's efforts, and the largest one was on Andurien. Dame Catherine Humphreys was not one of his father's favorite people, and she fully returned his hatred and contempt, making any reconciliation the next best thing to impossible. "We might need…"

"No. I know what you're going to suggest but no. Dame No will not benefit from the hard work and dedication of patriots without paying her due." Janos shook his head firmly, setting his jaw in a way that let both men know he wasn't going to be changing his mind. "Technicron Manufacturing still has the capabilities that we need here, and they aren't traitors in the making. Let them play with it William, but watch them closely, we cannot afford to give the Lyrans, or worse yet the Capellans, any of our advantages."

"It will be done," William accepted his orders easily. Savannah was a lot closer than Andurien, much easier for him to move the data there without sending it through the HPG chain. For all Comstar liked to pretend they were neutrals, he was the director of SAFE. They at least still remembered the Comstar war.