Copeland Supply, Salvage, and Resale

by cliff.west

This is a spinoff story. It takes place after "But a somehow a most melancholy" and" Hunted Tribes". Please read those before this bit of work. I will not be recovering those stories, but re-reading them will help you fallow this story. This fiction also will be slow on the combat action.

19. Chapter 19 4 April 3047

Someone sent me a PM on a guest acount. That did not work so great. To answer the quistion. Working on it, and you might want to check out the "Battletech" boards. Something is just starting.

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Chapter 19

By Cliff

Beta and Clean up: Not done

Reviewed by Hotpoint.

4 April 3047

A short tour around space

Bivouac system

Over the next three months. The ships moved through space stopping and trading at various planets and space stations. Sometimes they would sell one of the computer systems, and sometimes they would sell one or two of the ultra-class cannons. They were spreading spots of high technology items all threw out the MC, going all the way threw to the outer edge of the FWL. They were working down the shopping list that they had been given, but Robert was also looking for other bigger ticket items that were not on the approved list.

They tried to sell the fighters, and the White Rabbit at every stop. But so far none of the planets they stopped at, had the funds to cover the price of those expensive machines. At least not on such short notices, the little convoy could spend at one location. Captain Copeland used mainly the funds from the sale of the high-tech gear to facilitate the purchases as they went. Whenever they stopped by a planet with a working HPG? He would tap more of the funds from the core account a few hours, before they would launch back to the jump point.

With the Mule class cargo ship now almost full of supplies, to the top of the cargo bays. Robert decided that it was time to make their way back to their home system. What they did not know, was that someone was tracking their movements. And they had predicted were Robert's next stop might be. Every time Robert accessed the funds, it would leave another bread crumb. It was public knowledge of how much cargo space those classes of ships had, at least down to the ton. It also was general information about what had been purchased by the little convoy. After that? It was only a math problem, and it was not a hard one at that. One of the groups tracking them were unhappy with Copeland and his people. And they were making plans to make life hard on the crews, if not kill them outright.

This star system was a low population outpost. The system did not even have a habitable planet that orbiting one of the twin stars. It was just a mining outpost set up to harvest the wealth found in the systems massive and numerous asteroid belts. The total population was housed in small or medium sized space stations, and the one massive recharging and cargo transfer station at the jump point. This massive structure was at the Zenith jump point, and it had been there for a very long time. It was thought, that it had predated the beginning of the Reunification War.

Captain Copeland was hoping, that they would be able to sell or trade one of the obsolete fighters they were still carrying for tons of strategic ores the miners should have in an abundance. Those hard to find ores could be used to augment, what was produced back on their home planet. During one of the daily meetings, Jess asked about why they were stopping here to buy those items. The planet called New Circe was hidden in a nebula, and they had access to plenty of mining sites a lot closer to home.

Robert explained, that yes. They did, but it took time to pull the ores out of the ground and then pre-process them. All before they could be used in making anything. If they could pick up a few tons of the hardest to find ores? Then that was a few tons. That would be ready to go straight to the factories, that were waiting to use them. Now that SLiE had these new engines. It was almost cheaper and safer to get them here, and then take them home. Then it was for someone in the home system to do all the work with their limited refining capabilities. Besides they were just topping off their cargo holds in the Mule, not taking on a full load of the ores.

The M/V Styx had fully deployed it's jump sail to recharge the Tramps "normal" jump engine. It had easily locked into place and was working as designed. On this trip. Robert had noticed that there were fewer jumpships listed as being down for repairs, than at any other time that he could remember. He had just brought that up with Jess before this jump. She was looking into this information.

Robert had just started negotiating with one of the deputy leaders of the system at her headquarters, over at the over one-million-ton space station. It was just another stop on the trade route, that Robert had worked out before they had started this run. As far as he could find out. This system had not been visited by a supply run, ever.

A very battered Leopard class CV activated it's massive engines and burned around the huge space station at full thrust. The bulk of the massive station was blocking the light fighter carrier from being viewed, and therefor blocked the targeting system of the Tramp Class jumpship. Once the Leopard class CV was clear of the blocking station? It was visible to the jumpship, and it also started to launch all six of the fighters that could be carried by that class of ship. They went into deep space in one massive wave of death and plasma plumes.

The bridge of the Styx was not a Warship, like one of the one's they had left behind to defend their planet from the Cylons. But the Styx was not exactly like a normal merchant ship or crew, ether. By now, most jumpships, that were still in operation. They were not like the ones, that had been in operations before the 1SW. When the strange ship came out from cover, provided by the sensor shadow offered by the massive Olympus Class station. They reacted, just like the well trained and motivated crew that they were. The crew of the Styx and the dropships, she was carrying, reacted with speed that was uncommon in the Inner Sphere.

"Sir! Scanners are picking up a targeting system! They are coming out from behind the radar shadow of the Station." The scanner operator paused for a second reviewing the changing information on their screens.

"Status change on Target 1. She is a Leopard Class carrier! We have six fighter sized target separating from the dropship at speed. Traffic Control is ordering them to wave off, but they are not responding!"

The operator's hand was pushing the General Quarters alarm, even as he was talking. This was sending all ship's crews to battle stations, to defend their ships. From first detection, to the GQ alarm? It was only eight seconds between the two events. The Styx was not the only command area picking up the bogie. The alert from the flagship, was just the icing on the cake, and proof about what the smaller craft had picked up.

Robert was still strapped into his seat on a video conference, with the space station. He flipped off the connection and started giving orders, without saying good-bye. "Communication! Signal all captains, defend themselves and keep to the proscribed range limits! We know that SLDF weapons tech has been showing up, but that does not void our orders. Hobgoblin is to launch all her fighters, and they are to focus on those other fighters. Hobgoblin and the White Rabbit are to close and engage the other dropship. They have to keep it off of the Styx, and the Lisbon Maru. They have to want to disable our ride home." Some of this information was not needed, but Robert was on a roll. Besides, this was the first attack on his command, and he was a little excited.

"Captain! The targeting system has been able to identify the fighter classes." The operator continued without waiting for permission to speak. "They are reading as all light fighter classes. We have two Centurions, two Sparrow Hawks, and two Cheetahs burning fast right towards us!"

Robert looked over to his friend and second in command, and he raised his eyebrows. "Jules! They will be wanting to get in as close as they can, as fast as they can. It's a pure interceptor type mission. This is going to be a knife fight. The longest ranged weapon they have, is going to be medium class lasers."

Both Robert and Jules were thinking that all those training missions before making this run, were the Cylon Raiders were the listed enemy. That was about to pay off, big time. Neither man has said a word, about what they were thinking. Basically, they had been friends so long? They just thought the same way, in combat. The attackers had a good plan, if they were going after the jumpship. If you were attacking a jumpship? You wanted the speed that light fighters were designed with. To get to you. They needed to get as close, as quickly as they could. Jumpships had few weapons and even fewer ships had any armor, but the Tramp class was a different animal. And a Wolverine run Tramp class? She was a way different animal, than these people were used to hunting.

A second crewmember sounded off, without turning to look at the commanding officers behind them. "The Hobgoblin and White Rabbit have separated from the collars. All weapon stations report manned and operational. The two Lightnings on ready alert, have launched. They are vectoring to be in an intercept position against the fighters."

"Sir! We have new fire control systems activating! The station is active! It looks like they are targeting the fighters." There was a space of dead air on the bridge. "The station is firing on the fighters."

The crewman paused for a few seconds. "Sir! They fired some lasers at the fighters as they passed, but they missed with every shot. I think they might have burst a few of their lasing barrels, when they fired them up. I picked up a few flashes on the hull of the station, as they fired. Looks like they were not that great at maintaining their defensive weapons. They did not even try to fire at the Leo, when it when by them."

Robert nodded his head. He knew that this station was old. "At least they tried. Make the station as a neutral on all IFF's. We will find out what they are about, later."

It was a long two minutes, as the group of SLDF in Exile watched the super-fast fighters charging ahead of the slower fighter carrier. Numbers on their screens showed several countdowns. One was the time, until the fighters were in range. The more important countdown was the one about, when the SLiE would be able to fire their weapons at the attackers.

"Sir! Hobgoblin reports all six fighters are launched and moving to blocking positions, and they will wait for them at." The crewman checked his screen, before passing the information to the officer's screens at their knees. "Point 54. The Leo is still coming behind the light fighters, strong. We are picking up unburned fuel in the exhaust of the Leopard. Its acting like it might have some unrepaired battle damage, in the engine area. I'm waiting on an image to process, to see if maybe they have some hull damage we can exploit. It might be a while before we get any useful visual data."

Robert was reviewing all the reports and some of the raw information, as it was coming into the bridge. "Let me know when you have a good image and pass along to the Hobgoblin your assessment of the dropship. Jules, this has the feel of a pirate raid to me. Keep an eye on the station. If they jump in on the leopard side? Then we see, if we can put enough holes in that hunk of junk to change their minds."

Jules looked at his commander. He was only five feet from his command chair, so he did not have to raise his voice to be heard. "Do we fast charge the engine and jump out of here? Or do we stay, and fight it out with the dropship?"

Robert looked over to his friend, and an evil grin came to his face. "We stay and fight. This is a fight that is in our favor, we have the advantage in the weight of firepower. That is unless, the station jumps in and helps these pirates. If it was a bigger attack? We would jump out, and then wait a few days. Before we came back, to pick up our chicks. I do think we need to cut the sail, just in case those faster fighters break through or go around our heavier fighters. We always have our Colonial drive, but that is not an ideal plan."

If they used the colonial jump drive, in an emergency? It was hoped that it would have the look, like a miss-jump to people who did not know about them. They would have to be "dead". None of the ships and the crews inside those ships would be able to come back to the Inner Sphere, ever. It also would make the SLDF Navy, and the leadership of their Clan, very upset with Robert and his command staff. It would not matter how many goodies, that they brought back with them. None of them would be able to leave their hidden planet again, for the rest of their lives. That was if everything worked out in Robert's favor, with his leadership.

Jules nodded and gave the order, to cut the recharging sail. Outside the over 600meter long jumpship. The kilometer-wide dark sail with its supporting lines, were disconnected from the larger ship. The term was "cut". But after the battle? The Jumpship's commander would want to recover the thing. Just a few massive connectors were undone, and the sail and the lines drifted away from the long metal can. The sail would drift away from the parent jumpships and start to collapse, making it a harder target for enemy fire.

Meanwhile out in the dark of space, that was the jump point. Gwen (Dude) Paul was strapped tightly into her 50ton Lightning aerofighter. She and her wingman had been sitting in their craft on alert status, when they had been catapulted out of the dropship Hobgoblin. It had been as soon as the red light and audio alarm of the GQ alarm had started to blast threw the dropship. They were the first defensive craft to get out of the fighter bays.

Gwen had been a very young pilot, on an earlier resupply run to the Inner Sphere. She had been good enough, to pass the test for one of those coveted positions for those multiyear missions. That last mission had been a long time ago. She had been given her handle of "Dude", on that run. The trading dropship, that she had been assigned to provide cover for, had stopped on some forgotten planet on the edge of nowhere.

Late one evening. A group of the local fighter jocks and the crew of the dropship, that she had been flying off of had some drinks in a local watering hole. When one of the locals had explained, in front of everyone. That she had a dude's first name, for her last name. From then on, her new call sign had been Dude. It had stuck all threw her long flying career. She thought her call sign most likely would be put on her gravestone, weather she wanted it or not. That was just one of the oddities of being a fighter pilot, and it did not just affect the SLiE.

She had been on the downhill slide of her career, and she had known it for years. She had tested down from the front-line units, over five years before the Colonial's had shown up. She had maintained her flight time, in second or even third line units. She would do anything, so that she could fly a few more hours, and it did not matter what craft she could get stick time in. This unwittily, had helped her later in life, with such a variety of craft under her belt. She was not only qualified but rated highly skilled in all of those different airframes. When they had offered her a position on this resupply run? She had jumped at the chance.

She knew that they would be able to take only fighters, that would blend in with the locals. She had tested at the top of the group. This meant that she had first pick from all the different aerofighters, that higher command said was going on the mission. She like the 50ton fighter, that she had picked as her primary ride. The massive auto cannon would be great in the anti-dropship attack roll. If she could get close in? It could take smaller fighters out in one hit, even if the 200mm cannon was old tech. It still had a massive bite, but you had to get someone in range of it. Now it was time to see if she was still as good on a stick, has she had been on the last trip.

The six enemy fighters were coming towards her and her wing man, at an incredible speed. The rest of the fighters were still coming up behind the pair of Lightnings. For now, it will only be her two fighters, against all six of the enemy light fighters. If they failed? She would die. There was no way, that she would be taken alive. That was something ingrained into the survivors of the Wolverines. It had been that way even before they had found those prison camps, when they first returned to the Inner Sphere.

Dude had time on the way out to her position, to study the mob coming her way. She selected the targets, that she wanted to focus on and passed the information to her wing man. She and her wing man started a pre-programed set of evasion maneuvers, with the engines facing the enemy fighters. Mainly it was to cut her forward speed, and it also put Dude where she wanted to be when the time was right. Thanks to the computer threat warbooks, and powerful systems on the military ships. She knew what those craft were packing, better than the pilots did. She still could get surprised, but it was not very likely.

The largest weapons that the group of attacking fighters had, was only medium class lasers. Just like what Dude and her wingman, had for secondary weapons on their pair of fighters. She was still waiting, when her radar systems told her that she was almost in range. Dude pulled the straps a little tighter, and she hunched down deeper into the cockpit. It was almost game time, and she could hear the blood pumping in her ears.

Gwen was looking in her cockpit. This type of flying was sometimes called "eyes in". This was opposite of how you would fight, if you were flying in an atmosphere. That was where you had to fly eyes out, or you died. That was keeping your eyes looking around the skies, trying to see if your enemy was trying to surprise you. In space? That was not a good way to fight. In space, your speeds were a lot higher and without a star or sun to cause glinting on an attacker.

This was where the radar and other electronic systems, became your best friend. Even with the HUD and the powerful radar. It was as much luck as skill sometimes, when you started a fight in the deep black. When she thought the time was right? She used the joystick in her right hand and pulled it backwards, hard. This caused her 50ton fighter to flip over, within its own length. Now the massive maul of a cannon was pointing in the general direction of the enemy attack force closing to attack their ride home.

Gwen and her wing man targeted and pulled the triggers, to fire every weapon they had at their assigned targets within seconds of each other. Then they both activated the main maneuvering thruster and flipped their ships 180 degrees again. Now they were waiting for their massive cannons to reload. Multitasking was the bread and butter of a fighter jock. It was time to pour on the fuel, while the cannons cycled, and the lasers recharged for the next round of fighting.

If you could not do at least three things at once? You failed out of pilot school and would do something easier. Something like being a tank crewman or maybe something like a mech driver. So even before her ship had completed its flip. Gwen was checking her system to check the damaged done to her fighter, by the invisible incoming laser fire. If the enemy is in range, then so are you. The attacking enemy ships also only had one chance to fire on her and her wingman, before they screamed passed the two "blocking" fighter's way too fast for human eyes to track. This type of combat was different than any other warfare, in the history of man.

Only five enemy fighters flew past the pair of Lightning's. That and one expanding ball of debris that had been a Centurion fighter only a few seconds before. The ball of gas was still moving thanks to the laws of physics, but now it was not a threat. When the two fighters had completed their flip? Each fired the massive nose cannon again, and a single pair of medium class lasers at the slightly smaller group. Her wing man rushed his shot, and only hit the last Centurion with only one of his medium lasers. That was only a 33 percent hit rate, and that was not going to get him any good marks in the post mission debrief. The single hit was in the aft section of the 30ton fighter, but it only burned a little armor plate in that location. All of that bad shooting had spiked the heat in the 50ton fighters, like they were sitting in a blast furnace.

Gwen "Dude" Paul was a better pilot, and a lot better shot with her craft. She was able to put the massive class 20 autocannon shell right up the center of the engine thrust bell of her target. She even hit with both of her lasers. All of her shots when into the aft section of the other fleeing Centurion. The combined damaged caused the second Centurion to explode, joining the other Centurion as an expanding ball of fragments and various hot gasses. It was that quick and two lives were lost, and over three million C Bills of equipment was destroyed in the cold of deep space.

Gwen did not keep engaging her main engine to pursue the other four enemy fighters. They were too fast for her heavier fighter to catch up to them, and they were now out of range of any of her weapons. Not for the first time, did she wish that they could have replaced the auto cannon with a great gauss rifle like in the 15b. It did not have the raw stopping power of the larger auto cannon per shot, but it had a lot longer range. It also had a lot lower heat generation potential per shot, than the older weapon had. One part of her brain knew that she could have gotten three or even four good high probability shots with that type of weapon. She made sure to check if the computers agreed, before she had to sit down for her post mission brief.

With this part of the battle over. Now Gwen had time to plan the next part of the battle with the battle management system in her craft. She was mentally writing up her report, while she waited. If the management system agreed? Then her wingman would be able to paint a half fighter silhouette on his craft. This was not like fighting skeet, but a kill was a kill. Gwen would be able to claim a half credit for the one fighter, and a full credit from the second Centurion. She did some quick math in her head, and then decided what the best next move might be.

The two fighters activated a set of thrusters and changed course, again. They now were going to be the first line of defense against the larger target provided by the enemy carrier, that was still burning towards them. That was what the massive cannon was designed to punch holes into after all, and it just happened. That there was one nearby, that needed that kind of attention. Besides they had just even the odds, number wise, for the other two lances.

The remaining deployed fighters of the Star League in Exile escorts did not have the time to get in an as good intercept position on the faster, but lighter fighters. The lighter fighters were able to use their higher speed to control the fight and avoid most of the weapons fire coming from the other Wolverine craft. Still only two of the enemy fighters were able to get past the heavier fighters intact, or otherwise combat capable. They might have been pirates. But that did not mean that they were not good pilots, or that they didn't know their business. Each one of them had years of combat experience, of one kind or another before today's battle.

One Cheetah and one Sparrow Hawk made it passed the SLiE heavy fighters. The two fighters were able to use the higher power to mass ratio, skill, and more than a little luck to avoid the two dropships that were following the angry heavy fighters. This delayed them, a little. Before they had started to again start to close in on the jumpship, that they had been told to make sure did not try to leave this system.

Both of the surviving attacking pilots were not happy. This was just supposed to be a show of force, to scare the jumpship into giving up to their carrier. They had done this type of job a half a dozen times, this year. All without any issues, worth worrying about. You know? Issues like not only having returning fire, but effective returning fire. Effective fire which already had cut their fighter force by two thirds, before they even had gotten to the target. That was just not right! Merchant ships and crews should just give up, and not fight. "It just was not fair," were the thoughts coming from those two surviving enemy fighters.

They were about to find out how unfair the universe can be, when they found out that their target was an armed jumpship. It was not the two pop guns, that an Invader class used to pop the odd rock that got in the way. They were about to run into a lot more weapons. Ones that were helped with a lot better fire control computers and better trained gunnery crews than any other jumpship within a thousand light years of this system.

The SLDF Cheetah had been the last to launch off of the Hobgoblin, due to an issue with the ancient catapult. Now that it was out in space, it went after the pirate Cheetah. It was trying to remove his twin from the universe. Very quickly the other fighter took him up on the challenge, to do the same to him. It was going to be an even match, to see who was removed first. The one enemy Sparrow Hawk shoved its engine to the max, and started an attack run on the huge jumpship. His radar said that he had a clear shot at the primary.

What the young pilot did not know, was that this jumpship was unlike the similarly sized Star Lord. It was armed to the teeth, and it even had an armored hull for protection. The light fighter hit the thick, well thick for what a jumpships normally carried, armor by a set of twin medium lasers. They did little more than ruin the paint job on that part of the long jumpship. Those pair of hits should have opened the jumpship's hull like an egg hit by a hammer.

The four extended ranged large lasers that returned fire, for the pair of mediums that had been fired at the jumpship. The quad gamma beams hit the small fighter and did more damage to the 20ton fighter. The small craft lost its nose all the way back to the aft firewall of the cockpit, to the incoming weapons fire in a flash of energy. Then the light fighter was out of the artificially reduced firing range, as only a closely flying debris field. These four hits killed the pilot first, and then later the engine exploded due to the overloading damage. The last had ended up destroying the light fighter totally. It was now just a bit of metal dust and the odd dinner plate sized chunk of hot, but quickly cooling metal and ceramics.

The five heavy fighters piloted by the SLDF in Exile led the attack against the enemy dropship, next. The locals on the space station were still trying to contact the dropship, but the dropship was refusing any contact from them or the Styx. There was no way this was an accident. It was all out war. The Leopard commander was going to take it, all the way to the hilt. Attacking a jumpship was something that just was not done. Now it looked like not only had he attacked a jumpship. He also had failed in his mission of attacking the jumpship. That was a double failure, and that was one more failure than he could live threw.

The space station was finally starting to flush its mobile defense force, to join the battle. Soon six heavy fighters and four Tigress class close patrol ships were in space and were closing as fast as they could to the action. They had deployed late from the massive station. They all also were slower than the attacking light fighters, and the Leopard had some good legs under her by the time they were launched out of their bays. There was no way that they would be able to arrive, before the three dropships engaged each other in combat.

The pirate Leopard should have just powered down his engines and weapons, after it had lost its strike force. But it had not. It just kept on charging towards the Styx, like a dog on a three-legged cat. The question is, who the dog was and who was the three-legged cat. The pirate Leopard was matched by Robert's Leopard, but it was not alone in the coming battle. It was supported by five of its fighters and the blockade runner's own weapons.

Gwen "Dude" made the first flyby of the enemy dropship, at some distance. Her report and the information that had been transmitted back to the Styx, showed a battle-damaged dropship. It was exactly what you would expect, on the Periphery of explored space. A combat unit on its last legs, then pushed over the edge and went pirate. Out here? There were very few people, that could stand against them. It was a lot of firepower in a small package.

If that dropship had ever touched down on a major planet, even one out here at the end of nowhere. The local port authority would have grounded it, as a hazard to navigation to other ships and a danger to the crew the hunk of junk carried. That did not mean, that it didn't have teeth. It was far from being toothless. It might have lost its long-ranged attack force made up of its fast fighters, but it still had enough weapons. That it could take out any civilian jumpship, ever made.

"Dude's" images showed that the pirate dropship had both shallow and deep craters blasted into the armored hull on all of its exposed surfaces. At this close range, even the ancient systems on the Lightning could not be spoofed, by paint or most common ECM tricks. Even the aft area, which all civilian dropship's captains tried to protect at all cost, had some damage. Damage that seemed to be affecting the engines of the almost 2,000ton ship. After her close flyby of the attacking dropship, she pushed a little closer for her next pass. This next pass was not going to be a "looksy". It was going to be a "shootsy" close encounter. She had been staying outside of her and the Leo's weapons range on the first pass.

Dude led the first attack run on the wildly maneuvering ship. The high-speed attack was mainly just meant to see what weapons were operational on the flying wreck. If she got a good solid hit on the craft on this pass? That was just gravy. The speed of the attack limited the exposure of the fighter to the counter fire coming from the enemy ship. It helped some, and the pair of fighters live to make a close pass of the pirate carrier.

This time both of the pilot scored hits with the large nose mounted auto cannon on the port side of the craft. They did not appear to do any real damage, because the dropship kept on going towards the jump point without slowing down. The attack run did generate some positive information. The pirate ship might look like a wreck, but it now showed that it indeed was armed to the teeth with functional weapons. This pass also showed that the weapons were better maintained then the local space stations had been. That was an interesting data point.

When Dude and her wing man had finished the attack run and pulled back out of range of the enemy carrier. The pair of fighters had not been hit by any of the returning fire. That might have been due to the piloting skills of the pair, or to the poor gunnery skill of the dropship's crew. They did receive a few close calls, but nothing that so much as blistered the paint on the two fighters. While they were checking their fighter's systems and letting the old heat sinks work down the load they had been put under during the attack.

They were joined by the rest of the convoy's heavy fighters. It was time for another high-speed attack run on the pirate. On this attack run, they were not as lucky in avoiding the enemy fire. The Vulcan took a PPC hit to the heavily armored left wing. Gwen's craft took some Long-ranged missile hits across both wings and the nose of her craft, but the armor protected her from any real threat. In return? The carrier was peppered with SRM, medium and heavy cannon shots, as well as a few laser hits. What was the key to winning this phase of the battle? It was heat management and putting in as many papercuts as the fighters could into the larger ship.

Now the five fighters were behind the large ship, and the distance was growing very quickly. A quick flip, and they were pointing there nose back toward the enemy ship. They all went to maximum thrust, as soon as they were lined back up on the target. This caused all of the pilots to feel the heat, down to their bones. They all were closed to the red line, but soon the heat sinks were bleeding the excess heat off that had mainly been generated by the weapons. The heat from the weapons was bleeding out now, that the weapons were not being fired anymore to add to the heat load the craft were working with. The max thrust setting on the engines was generating a lot of heat, but the birds were made to handle something like that.

It did not take them long to come to a stop in space, and for then to start the long stern chase to retarget the enemy dropship. Soon they were closing the range for an attack on the exposed engines of the larger vessel. While they were still out of range of the dropship. Dude had a complete tech readout of the design specs on this class of dropship to review, and then she could compare it with what her systems had been able to collect.

The Vulcan with its pair of far shooting class 10 autocannons, the super heavy Stuka's large box LRM's launcher and its four Large Lasers, and the Ironsides packing paired PPCs. These three craft were the first shooters of the attacking fighters on the wildly evading craft. The lighter and shorter ranged Lightnings were not going to play a part. One of the fighters would close to long range, and then fire their longest ranged weapons at the fighter carrier. Then they were to fall back to vent the heat generated by firing all of those weapons, as the dropship opened the range and pulled away again. Then the next craft would enter range of its weapons and fire their heavy weapons. They would keep rotating the fire point, as long as the dropship kept heading towards the jumpship.

The Leopard CV was built with only one large laser class weapon and a few medium class weapons to cover the engines, and the whole aft area of the dropships. Dude and her group were taking advantage of this knowledge, to target the enemy vessel. From there current attack location. They would only be facing one large laser weapon, that could return fire at this range. The Lightnings had more fire power, but they would have to get very close to use it effectively. They needed to try to make the pirate Leo react to them and keep the jumpship safe. The plan on how to do that? it was to keep hitting the now empty carrier and make its Captain lose his focus on attacking the Styx.

The five fighters were not able to hit, with every weapon. That was due to the range they were choosing to fire from. And the target was doing whatever it could, so that the attacking craft would miss with those weapons shots. The Vulcan was the first fighter to score a telling hit on the larger craft. That was when the large laser turret was blown off the dropship. The large turret, with the laser weapon still attach. All went flying off into space as the larger part of the ship was still under acceleration, and the turret…..was not. The five craft did not transmit a word at seeing the weapon come off. They were five sharks, and blood was just thrown into the water.

The five attacking craft went blazing past the weapons turret, and Gwen was even able to get some images of the hunk of junk go flashing by. The Vulcan pilot would swear later that it almost clipped his cockpit, when the weapons went streaking past. Up until this time? The enemy dropship captain had been content on maneuvering, and letting the weapons take care of the Nits attacking behind him. With the aft area of the dropships only longer ranged weapon out of the equation? The nits had also proven that they had teeth, and they knew how to use them. It just showed that the Commander of this craft was not that skilled in fighting a near peer threat.

Now the five fighters could press in closer to the dropship, before firing their weapons. Gwen was the first person, that saw the thrusters on and near the nose of the dropship start to fire. She was just able to warn the other fighters, that the ship was about to flip. Maybe it was to bring its heavy nose guns and wing weapons into play against them.

By the time that the nose was facing towards Gwen, and her compatriots. They had moved out of range of those weapons. The fighters were just nimbler, and with that little warning Dude had given them? That was enough for the group, to avoid getting killed by a sudden appearance of many powerful and long ranged weapons. Mostly it was a case of thrust management for the smaller fighters to pull out of range of the long-ranged weapons.

With the nose of the dropship pointing at the fighters. It was not adding speed for the attack run on the Styx. This gave more time for the White Rabbit and the Hobgoblin to close on the enemy dropship. This let them start the engagement farther from the more fragile jumpship. That move, was what Gwen had been trying to get the Leo to do from the first attack. The attacking commander was now reacting, instead of Acting. Now all he needed to do was show some smarts, and totally break off the attack on the jumpship.

After a few pointless volleys of weapons fire from the nose mounted weapons bays, at the distant and wildly evading fighter sized targets. The enemy dropship fired its nose thruster again, and this time when it stopped. It was not aimed at the Tramp Class jumpship, but at an empty point in space that made it clear that it was not going to be targeting the long vessel.

It was just outside of the "normal" jump point area, but it was still safe from the gravity effects of the local star. If someone knew what they were doing, it would be safe for a jumpship to use. It was still close enough to the recharge station to be "safe" to use. When the dropship was still in flipping motion. It fired its massive rear mounted engines, and they went into overthrust mode straight from the idle setting. She was putting her crew under almost three g's of loading from 0g, in just a few heartbeats.

The Stuka driver was quick off the mark and was closest to the enemy dropship. He was able to throttle up and lined up for a long-ranged snapshot. It was on the weakened aft of the dropship, that filled his targeting reticle. It was the broad side of a barn target. The Stuka fired the huge 20 tube long ranged missile battery, and all four of its big bore lasers in one big Alfa strike.

This action put the 100ton fighter in a severe heat issue, as soon as the weapons cycled after firing. This quickly overloaded the heat management system and caused the fighter to auto shut down its Fusion engine in a blink of an eye. At least until it could vent the massive amount of heat caused by all of that weapons fire, and the over thrusting of the engine. If it had not shut down? There was a good chance that the attacking fighter might have an ammunition explosion or an engine breach of some kind. Both would be listed as a not a good thing, to happen for the pilot.

Three of the large lasers hit the target, as well as over half of the long-range missiles. The weapons fire was impacting along both of the left and right wings, as well as the already damaged aft section of the fighter carrier. To the people in the targeted dropship. It felt like someone had hit the outside of the Leopard with a series of hammer blows, some stronger or larger than others. This was not the first combat mission for most of the crew, but it still was distressing to the members of the carrier to be hit so hard. Then things sounded different, and not in a good way.

The dropship gave a visible shutter, after all of the damage the Stuka had done to it. It was clear, to the whole universe that the dropship was in trouble. Then a massive explosion wracked the dropship. There was a massive infer-red energy spike that had started at about the midship line. The little dropship split into two parts like it had been pulled apart by the hands of the gods. The aft part was made up of the high tail stabilizer, what was left of the engines, and part of each of the aft most two fighter launch bays on the ship.

The forward section of the dropship was blasted off and at an angle, away from the two approaching dropships that had launched from the Styx. Both parts of the once high-tech dropship, now were adrift in space with the last bit of thrust provided by the explosions sending them on at least a dozen different course headings. Both of the large parts were still going out into interstellar space, at a very impressive turn of speed relative to the nearby space station.

The Hobgoblin increased its thrust to the maximum, that the little for a dropship could safely maintain. The Captain of the fighter carrying dropship, intended to destroy whatever was left of the enemy dropship. That was how SLiE handled attacks from pirates in the past, and that was how he was going to handle them now. It was something ingrained into the Wolverine's DNA. There would be no attempt to board the wreck of the dropship. High Command had never thought to bring along marines, on this smaller mission. The Captain of the carrier would use the ship mounted heavy energy weapons, to take care of any hazards to navigation. At least that was the plan of the command crew of that ship, anyway.

The Olympus class space station seeing that the pirate dropship and fighters had been neutralized, for the moment, had started blasting the radio frequencies with energy. They were ordering the Hobgoblin and her fighters, to stand down and leave the area of conflict. They were claiming jurisdiction over the whole area, that had been in conflict today. They did not resort to open military threats, but they were pulling legal attacks.

Two Mark VII landing boats now moved out from the cover provided by the patrol craft. The mix mass of small crafts was burning as hard as they could towards the area of battle. The locals had the manpower, and more importantly. They were trained in this type of capture in the deep of space. That was something that this crew, from outside of human controlled space, had also not brought on this mission. The Hobgoblin's Captain was prepared to ignore the orders from the space station, but after the orders are repeated from Captain Copeland. He changes his mind. He did not have much choice in the matter.

The fighter carrier flipped over and decelerated, to come to rest near the battle area. It would be keeping an eye on everything that was happening. Only after coming to a stop, did it then start to retrieve three of the group of fighters it had launched at the start of the battle. It was leaving the two Lightning's in space, to return to the jump point at a more leisurely speed. They would provide the combat cover to the Styx. That is while the three heavier craft could be refueled, rearm, and any repairs that needed to be done. At least one of the heavy fighters would be ready when the local's showed up. The longer it took the locals to decide to do something dumb. The more prepared the remaining heavy fighters would be.

The little Cheetah was already near the jumpship, after destroying the same type of fighter flown by the pirates. It was due to the superior skills of the Star League pilot. Later the recorded data would be used to show younger kits. That the skills they were learning could be used to beat anyone in an equal fight. It had been the sole protector for the Styx and the Maru, until the twin 50ton fighters could cover the distance back to the jumpship.

The Hobgoblin would stand on station watching the recovery effort, on what was left of the pirate dropship until it was recalled by the flagship. After the locals had boarded what was left of the dropship. She and her remaining fighters were directed to return to a closer position near the Styx and her important cargo.

After the Hobgoblin completed the engine burn, it now came to a rest only 20 KMs from the long jumpship. It started to recover the three fighters waiting on her and replaced them with the three heavier fighters. The heavy fighters had completed another refitting cycle, while the dropship returned to her only way home. Besides watching over the Styx. The CAP also covered the two SLiE small craft as they recovered and attached the jump sail back onto the jumpship.

In a few hours, but less than four, the pair of Lightning's would replace the three other fighters as the CAP. The Stuka and Cheetah would be the replacements on the next shift for the Lightnings. Two fighters would be on CAP, at all times. Two other fighters would be on alert, with pilots sleeping in the cockpits. Every weapon on the four larger ships, would be manned at all times. It would stay that way, until they left this system. This was just in case this was only the opening move of a larger attack, that might be coming at them. The bad part? It was that this attack, was just another week on the edge of the Inner Sphere.

That was how the rest of the day went. A few hours before the start of the night shift, a small jumpship of the Scout class appeared in the system. This sent all the ships' crews running to battle stations. It did not matter whether they were stationed or lived in the system, or they were just visiting. The whole star system was on alert, after the Leo's little surprise attack on the visiting jumpship. No one wanted to be the next victim, of another surprise attack. The actions of the space station were noted, on the bridges of all the craft connected to the armed jumpship. Robert had to stay in this system for another hundred hours, unless he wanted to "Hot Charge" his drive. At this point he still was not willing to do that.

The small jumpship did not launch a dropship but waited for some time before contacting the recharge station. They were seeing if there were any dropships, that might need transport out of this twin star system. They said that they were running empty and heading for a charter in FWL controlled space. They could use the additional money, generated by picking up any handy hitchhiker. That was strange for a commercial operation, but not unheard of in this part of space. It was very unheard of for this to happen with a small Scout class ship.

The Scout class jumpship going by the name of Happy Times II, deployed its jump sail and waited for a potential customer to contact them. Robert did not buy the story for one second, that they just happened to come in this system empty. After only a few hours of being attacked by a lone dropship, that was without a ride out of the system. It just was too good to be true. Robert was working on, that if something was too good to be true? Then it probably was.

Robert asked twice, over the next few hours, to be allowed to make a flyby of the new jumpship with a pair of his fighters. He wanted to check out the strange jumpship. Both times, Traffic Control had denied his request. The local station did run flybys with their own fighters and patrol craft, multiple times on the smallest class of jumpship. They reported back, in a coded frequency, that the jumpship did not have a dropship on its one collar. It was also reported, that it looked to be in very good repair minus some minor body work or paint. Robert made a bet with himself, that they had a few platoons of space trained troopers on board that small jumpship.

Robert was reading the latest intercepts between the local fighter patrol, and the massive space station. The HPG team was just as good picking up the local communications and breaking their codes. They were talking about the Scout, not knowing that Robert, and his crew, were picking it up almost as fast as they were sending the coded transmissions. He looked over to Jules, his XO and second in command of the convoy and resupply mission.

"Jules, what is the output of our radar system at maximum output?"

Jules had to turn to look at his commander, and he gave him an odd look. "Sir? I have no idea. But I do know, that it's strong enough. That if you are standing near it at full gain? Your kids will have three arms. It won't matter if you had a radiation suit on, or not. Why?"

Robert looked at his longtime friend and gave him the evilest grin, that Jules had ever seen on his friend's face. "Jules, warm up all the systems. I am not falling for this thinly veiled lie. I want them to know, that we are not buying it. I want you to see, if you can blister their paint with our radiation output. When you're ready? Just do it, don't wait from me to order it. I want to send a powerful message, to everyone."

Now it was Jules that had a grin like a shark and nodded to his boss. "Can do, boss. It will take a few hours to make sure we can put the power out, without breaking something important. One way or another, we will get a hull shot of them."

Robert was off shift, when it happened. It was almost six hours after Robert had given his direction, when it was executed. Jules was not planning on using just the Styx's systems, after he started working on his orders. He had gotten with all of the dropship's captains and engineers. Not surprising. Each of the dropship's captains wanted to be in on this game. It took a lot of work to get all of the different systems ready. But when they "flipped the switch"? The Styx, all three dropships, and all six of the fighters pointed there targeting and range finding systems at one spot in space. Within one second? All of their souped-up systems were turned up to 11.

The energy output on target was not enough to boil or even blister the paint. Not at the distance, that separated all the craft. It was enough to get everyone's attention and set off alarms all over the whole star system. When the local Traffic Control had called. Well screaming, is a better description, of their attempt to contact. Jules had told them it was simply a systems test; in case any trouble might show up in this system.

That statement had caused the person on the radio to calm down. A new voice from the station asked, that the next time they felt like doing that again. A little warning would be nice. Jules was non-committal in his reply to the locals, on that last request. They had not liked it, not one bit, but it was not like they had been attacked in this system before or anything. The betting boards on the jumpship went nuts after the radar tests.

Not everything was focused on the small jumpship. Copeland and his crews also were able to watch and evaluate how this star system recovered the wrecks of the fighters, and the dropship of the late pirate attack force. After the closest Tigress class patrol craft had inspected both parts of the wrecked Leopard. The two Mark VII Landing crafts made contact with the hull. It did not take long for them to put aboard their space suited armed troops on the hulk.

One of the Landing Boats was on each of the two largest parts of the wrecked dropship. With this part of the mission complete. The four heavily armed small craft fired their engines, and they went to track down, and check out the remains of the six pirate fighter craft. The patrol craft were able to attach tow lines to the three salvageable light fighters. The underpowered patrol craft then started the slow process of towing the wrecked small fighters back to the space station and her repair bays. That would be where they could see, what they could do with the wrecks.

The fourth Tigress class ship made its way back, to what was left of the leopard class carrier. It was to see. If it could help start the recovery of the larger part of what was left of the Leo, just like they were doing with the three wrecked fighters. At least that was what Robert and his crews were able to get from their eavesdropping.

The locals had only found two of the aerofighter pilots alive. One of them was not expected to live, long enough to make it back to the main medical support facility on the recharging station. They also found out that the aft section, of what was left of the fighter carrier, only had one person left alive on it. The forward part of the ship had fared better, and the locals had found a whole six people alive on that part. Two of them were hurt so bad. That they might not live to see another twenty-four hours, even with the medical facilities on the station.

The Styx and all of the dropships were recording everything they could, and even the techs from the HPG system were helping on their off shifts. Robert wanted to catch as much information, as they could. You never knew, what they might find out. Some of it could turn out to be useful information, when they made it back to New Circe.

It was not every day. That you got to see and record, how another group recovered a battlefield in deep space. A Normal jump point location? That was about as deep space, as any group would get since the jump ship had become the only way to travel between the stars. As far as Robert knew. Only the Colonial's had more experience in recovering of ships in very deep space, than anyone else in all of explored space.

While the Aft section of the Leopard was still coasting out into deeper space. One of the MK VIIs had set up a trapeze towing system, and it had started to work on slowing the wrecked engine section. The second MK VII and the only remaining Patrol Craft attached a similar system, to the larger forward section of the dropship. It was with a lot of interest Robert took notes, because he had never seen a system like this before in his life. The SLiE would have just used a dedicated Tug class Dropship to do this type of work. That was expensive, and there were few tugs still active within the SLDF navy. He was thinking that this technique might be useful back home.

It was a tug of war between the ant or two ants, and a dead elephant. Slowly they started moving the massive parts of the wrecks back towards the station, and the repair bays that the Olympus class station was known to have. The little ships would run their ship's engines past there maximum rating, till they started to overheat. Then the small craft would shut down, until their engines cooled back down. And then they would repeat the process and keep doing this over and over again.

Robert and Jules had a running bet on how long it would take, until whoever was in charge of the station launched a dropship to help with the recovery. With its higher powered and stress rated engines. Something like that would speed up the process of getting the larger parts of the wrecks closer to the open repair bay, and out of the jump point hazard area. Robert had rotated off of duty, and the expected dropship still had not launched from the station.

Before he had left the bridge, and before the attention signal, he had planned had been activated. Jules had even tried to contact the commander of the station, to demand that Robert should be able to question any survivors of the attack. He had been handed off to a less senior officer and who listened, but could not, or would not grant his request.

Robert did not think, that even he could have talked directly to the station commander. That she would have granted him the permission to talk to any prisoners? Robert knew that it would not happen this soon, after capture. Robert had to go through those steps, because it was expected that someone in his place would do those things. After one more check in the box. Robert went back to his cabin, to get some much-needed sleep. He thought tomorrow was going to be a very busy day. It was that feeling in the back of his mind, and he listened to it. More importantly, he used that little voice to help plan for some future events.

In space, there is never a sunrise or sunset. When you're so far away from the center of a solar system? There is not even a very bright center star to judge what your day or night cycle might be. It is only one light that maybe is a little brighter, than the others from the point of view of those at the jump points. One hour of any shift, was the same as any other hour. It was devoid of any outside reference points. It was just clocks counting hours, minutes and seconds.

When Robert returned to the bridge of the Jumpship Styx, after spending some time in the gravity decks gym and a quick low water shower afterwards. After reviewing the notes from the outgoing officer of the deck and checking a few personal things. He was ready to start his day. He was waiting for the other shoe to drop. He thought something was coming. If it did not? Then he was going to be the one to drop the other shoe.

Notes:

The battles. Yes, they were played out at the local FLAGs. It was between two players, that did not know it was going to be written into a story. It was a right pain to write it up. I do not know if I will do that again, or not. The enemy force was randomly rolled by using the books. I had wanted a more balanced battle, but I had to keep it "real".

Recovering or Salvaging on a moving battlefield in very deep space. If you think about the math to do something like this to much? It will give you a headache, or a lot of sleepless nights. Now how would a system that did not have shipyards or the right space infrastructure to take advantage of a sudden windfall.

Bivouac system? It is just a system that I made up. I used the rules of system generation and it just… was. That was how I had to write it and come up with some plot points for it to make sense. I will say that it was enjoyable to try to come up with a why and connect some of the dots, without breaking Battletech's timeline to badly.