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.

28. Chapter 28 27 Nov 3047

Chapter 28

By Cliff

Beta and Clean up: Not done

Reviewed by Hotpoint and Cannonshop

27 Nov 3047 the second run

Dunianshire System

It took a few days to burn at 1g for the three dropships to go from the jump point to planetary orbit. Robert used that time to contact Lora, and a few others on the ship's mounted Radio. They also sent a list of items for sale and what they were looking to buy, to the right people. Unlike the last visit to this system. The messages were returned by both Lora and Mr. McDonogh very quickly. Mike McDonogh was the first to reply by about half an hour. He wanted to set up a time to have dinner at the place that Robert was known to use. The name was not mentioned but Robert knew exactly the place that was referenced.

The landing at the drop port went without a hitch for the two dropships. The Hobgoblin would remain in high orbit and stay within easy range of the drop port. It was also in range of a Union CV class dropship, and an Avenger class assault dropship that were also in orbit. Those 2 combat craft were not flying or advertising as being under the MC flag. Any Leopard class carrier would have been dead meat, to that amount of firepower. Robert and the other Captains did not have to request the information, to know that those ships belong to MMM or at least they belong to someone that owed them more than a few favors.

The two cargo carrying dropships landed a few hours after noon local, at the main drop port. By the time the ground was cool. Commander Copeland had a dozen requests to look at their goods, which his paperwork had said was for sale. They also had a growing list of sellers actively wanting some of Copeland's money. All of them thought that they might have items, which he was looking for and were not on any published list. The plan was to spend five full days here, with a possible extension to stay on the ground for a total of seven days. That was only if, things went well. From the flood of messages, they had already received. It seemed like this was going to be a very different stay, than on their last stop by this star.

The two dropships and crews were well remembered, and soon a taxi service was set up to service the two crews very close to the dropships. Robert and Jess had the first meeting, and it was not with Lora. She was coming over after the dinner with Mike had been concluded. She was tracking down a few recent rumors that could not wait.

When Robert and Jess showed up for dinner at the Café'? They were greeted with smiles and pats on the back when they checked in. They even were jumping a line of about fifteen people still waiting for a table. The pair were quickly taken to the second floor and a booth that was very familiar to them. Robert made an offhand comment to Jess, that he could get use to this kind of service. Robert and Jess were still on their first drink, when a familiar man in a very expensive looking suit was escorted to their booth by one of the restaurant's staff.

Mike McDonogh was still the head of all MMM assets in this whole star system. He was dressed like he was heading into a major board meeting, and his face was well known planet wide. He started talking as soon as his hand went out to shake Roberts. Robert noticed that Mike had just a little dirt under one of his fingernails, but that was the only blemish on the man. He had to fight to not jerk his head up when Mike started talking like a waterfall.

"I'm sorry about your last visit, Captain Copeland. The week before you jumped into our system. ComStar had sent some very high ranked people out, and they used some basic strong-arm tactics on "US". When that did not work to the level, that they thought it should? They even went all the way to blackmailing and bribery. They hit more than a few key members of my staff and a lot of the same at the main office on Canopus. It took some time to get everything worked out, but it was worked out in the end. I hope that we can work together again."

Mike had a thin-lipped look on his face. He was sticking to the cover story that the Head Offices' Legal department had drawn up. It was mostly true, but not all the way true, and he knew it. Everyone was hoping that Copeland did not have the resources in the local area to find out all of the truth. Mike thought that the head office was making the wrong call. He would stick with the plan, until he was sure that Copeland did not still hold a grudge.

Robert let go of the hand and pointed for the man to have a seat. "Sir, I understand. I won't say that we are happy, about how we were treated on our last visit. We definitely lost some money on that stop; with the overhead I have to deal with. But I understand why you needed to take that route. And we found out early enough about it, so we could cut our losses."

Robert wanted to at least put out his side of the story, to this major power player. From what Lora had told them, there were a huge number of rumors running around the system on what had happened. And not one of them was even close to being true. Lora thought that ROM might have been behind about half of the rumors. "ComStar was not willing to understand. That we are on a contract, and I do not break my word. I hope we can do business again, but how about some good food first?" Robert did want to do business with this man. But if he could not? He at least did not want him, or his company actively trying to block or blackball them.

The MMM man had a salesman's smile, but he quickly agreed to the offer of food. They spent the rest of the time working out some details while they were eating. Mike thought that he was doing good not to have been told thank you for the apology, and now please leave us alone. Also make sure the door does not hit you on the ass when you leave.

Robert made sure to let Mike know that they had noticed the change of attitude city wide while they were eating. One let down was that Robert told the head of MMM, that he was not looking for lasers in the 1ton class on this trip. In fact, he was told that they were not looking for what the average person would call the most normal weapons. Robert was not even interested at buying them, at the friends and family discount rate Mike had offered. It was to help make amends, for how Robert had been treated on his last stop on this planet. He was happy to find out, that Robert was looking to get a few more dropship's engines like he had picked up on his first run to this planet. Mike knew that he could sell a few and it still would not affect the output of his dropship yards. The added quick money on the other hand would be very useful. Mike had so many projects working at one time, that he had very little in the way of liquid capital right now.

Robert could tell that the other man had not enjoyed the news that Robert was not looking for another fifty or so medium lasers. He wanted a way to change the subject, and he remembered the Jumpship he had sold the man. He was betting that MMM had been keeping a few grosses of medium lasers in storage, just in case he came back.

"How is that Scout, we sold to you working out? You were talking about using it, to be a way to save you some money on shipping out your products to some of your noncapital world clients."

McDonogh almost choked on his drink at the sudden change of subject. After he cleaned off his chin, he looked right at Robert. "Well, it worked out in some ways better and worse, than I hoped that deal would turn out. For one thing. MMM does not own that vessel anymore. It would seem, that someone wanted that vessel very badly right after you left. They not only paid full price, but a little over retail list price for her. On top of that, we got some "favors". It was only later. That we found out that some of those "favors", were going to cost a lot more than some of my staff and legal department had first thought. I can tell you that it was a very unpleasant surprise unveiled to my staff and the Home Office." Mike was a very good actor, and his face did not move a millimeter that he did not want it to while he talked.

Both Jess and Robert were looking levelly at the other man. Robert was the first one of the pair to voice his thoughts, that had run through both of their minds at hearing this news. "Really? Who would do that?" Robert already had an idea of who might do something like that. He was just fishing for some kind of confirmation. You never know. A third party could have come out from the woodwork, like a certain clan combat unit in hiding.

McDonogh returned the look with his own matching one. He did not like it when people try to play the fool. This one time he decided not to hold it against the Captain. He had an idea of how much he had lost on the last run to this planet. It was not just measured in the Fee's that had been charged to his company.

"Captain Copeland! I think you know who would do something like that, and that have the resources to do it on short notice. I would not worry too much about who that ship now belongs to. I had some of my men at the jump point check out the craft. I will say that whatever you did to the NavCom, was perfect. Then putting new hard drives in the primary and back up data storage bays? There will be no way that anyone will be able to use that to back track your travels. My people went ahead and replaced the primary data storage, with one that was… less than functional." Mike had a devilish grin on his face.

Jess let out a soft giggle. She had a mental image of a ComStar team doing their prayers and then pulling the device they had been talking about. But it turns out to be basically only a hunk of useless ceramic. When eyes turned to her she gave a slight shoulder shrug and used the attention to her advantage.

"I bet they were not happy, when they found that out. What else did they want? If you don't mind me asking? And what were you able to get out of our robed friends?" Jess was leaning forward on the table, and she was grinning like a schoolgirl. The bad part? It was that she was not faking the grin. She was about to fall out of the booth laughing. It was like your high school or work rival finally getting what they deserve, and not in a good way for them.

McDonogh felt a true smile come to his face, as he understood the younger woman for the first time. This group really did not like ComStar. And they were happy, that maybe someone had been able to get some advantage over the communication and shadowy power player. He had been worried that these people were going to be upset with his company and him, for what he had to do. He decided to throw out the script that the head office's legal department had given him.

"We got double the "normal" price for one of those "real" KWI's you sold us. Besides all of the funds that they infused the company with the sale of the Scout and the recovered blackmail and bribery funds. They also helped MMM fix some long-term issues, which we had with our Vlar 300 and Core Tech 275 fusion engine production lines. They had already help get the Vlar line fixed on Canopus, to get our output back up to what our records say was close to what it was doing when the planet was hit the first time by the SLDF. They were still working on the facility here, that makes the Core Tech line of engines when you came back. They threatened to stop work and pull everyone off the job, if we had contact with you on the last run. That would have shut down the whole Shadow Hawk line for years, and we would have been reduced to only being able to make spare parts for that line of mechs. That was one of the "favors" that I think cost too much, but the Board of Directors overruled me. They had seen what the increase in output of the Vlar line could mean to the whole company. And they were thinking that they would get the same out of the Core Tech line."

He was not going to say that the head office might have been right about that call. He had seen what had happened when two dozen Shadow Hawks with the updated cannons had done for his bottom line. Mike stopped talking for a few seconds. The other favor had been helping with a very secretive project that MMM had been working on for almost 80 years. He gave a visible shoulder shrug and continued.

"The other favor that they had threatened to pull out of, was a long-term project that was very close to my mother's heart. We have been working on adding a Clint 3T line to this planet's production capability. The Capellan Confederation has the lion's share of what remains of that design. It is seen as a possible major export opportunity for MMM, even if we can only make some spare parts and not the whole machine. Currently no one is making even spare parts for that design in the whole Inner Sphere, after the destruction of the Bell facilities."

Robert had to hide a small smile. He saw an opening and he quickly decided that he would see how far this "New openness" would go. "Have those "Favors" started to pay off for you?" Robert was glad that he had ordered two bottles of nice wine for the table at the start of the meal. McDonogh was on his third glass of the stuff already. Robert did not think that the wine was the cause of the openness, but it sure as hell did not hurt.

Now the businessman had a huge smile on his face. "Our MAD-3R line should be up to twelve machines a year average at the end of this month. Even with that increase, we will be able to put half a dozen engines on the open market as replacement parts. Normally we could only put one or maybe two extra engines on the market a year, as well as a few other spare parts. There are high hopes that we will be able to get up to between 18 and 24 new Marauders coming off the line by the end of next year. I have put a third more Shadow Hawks on the market this year already. Not all of them were new builds, but we pulled in some of the hulks over from the trade in lot. Next Year? I am looking at making more Hawks than Locusts. I might even be able to make more Hawks, than the whole output of Bristol SalvageWorks!" Mike realized he had raised his voice just a little too loud and he shot a look around the room, but it seemed like no one had noticed his increase of speaking volume.

"The new Clint line has not had enough time to really settle out all of the production issues and minor bugs. With the help of ComStar to fix some issues, and to give us some of the right equipment. We should be able to make about a dozen mechs or so a year. I think we will be able to double that output in another year, if not more. We have already made two full up machines. We are using them for testing out some new ideas. Mainly they were made just to make sure that all of the parts would fit just right. We just finished a run of a half dozen gyros, and the Confederation already showed up with the money to take them all off of our hands. Our copy of the Sloan 22 lockover is basically still being handmade. My plan is that we will not be making anymore full on machines for at least the next 6 to 8 months. We are taking a page from the local hover car strippers. We can make more money off of the spare parts market, than we can by selling whole machines. At least for now. When that market is more balanced, we will put whole machines back on the open market."

He was not going to tell these people that his company held the core data to do this, because of the MC support to Stefan Amaris and building up of "The Secret Army" all of those centuries ago. That was something that he had only found out a decade ago, at his father's deathbed. Even after all of these years, that information could cause some significant public relations issues.

"We have had buyers coming from as far away as the FWL. All of them are sniffing around for a Hawk with one of your cannons fitted on them. You have been a major boon for my company, Commander Copeland. The doors those updated machines have opened just within the Magistracy is nothing short of amazing. We now have a fully funded R and D lab on this planet, that has over half of its annual budget coming from the Government." McDonogh looked around the room again, and then leaned a little closer to Robert. "That was just from the "favors and selling those Cannons. I'm working on both updating the Leopard building facility and building a larger one, like a Union sized repair hangar larger one. Did I also poison the well of the golden goose, which made all of this possible?" He was hoping that Robert had not blackballed him from any sales. Nothing had been said, but Mike wanted to ask as pointed of a question as he felt like he could.

Robert looked at Jess and then back to the other man. "No, you did not. In fact. One of the main reasons I wanted to have a meeting with you, on the last trip. It was, that I think I might have found something that might be interesting for you and your company. Tell me, have you heard of the Bivouac system?"

McDonogh rocked back in his seat. It was like he had just been hit in the face with a cream pie out of the blue. It was good news, to know that the only near-term source of royal grade weapons, was not holding a grudge against him or MMM. The shock was the name of the system that had just been dropped on him. He had read a report last week about that very system. "As a matter of fact, I have. I understand that they have been offering repair services for anyone with the money and the time, for them to do the work on their dropships or jumpships. My staff thinks they are going to burn threw whatever spare parts they have left, within the year. Why?"

Jess gave a sly smile, and Robert gave her a hand wave for her to finish the line he had just opened. "I would not bet; on that they will run out of parts anytime soon. Or in the long term, for that matter. We happen to know that they were able to reboot an old Star League small space factory. The system manager had some big plans. She shared some of them with us, after we helped with a little pirate problem that showed up." She was not going to say that the pirate had been there to attack her people. MMM could find out that information, if they wanted to. She had just wanted to let Mike know that they had a very good source for that information.

Robert nodded and then picked up the line of thinking, which Jess had flawlessly followed. "If you sent out a ship with some extra weapons out that way? You might be able to talk them into making a run of Endo Steel for you. What would a hundred tons of that stuff be worth to you?" Robert ended his statement with raised eyebrows.

McDonogh's jaw was swinging open in the wind. If he would have had this information a few months ago? What could he have done with it? He did not speak for a few seconds as his mind went down the path of possible lost opportunities. "That could be an interesting opportunity. What do you get out of it?"

Robert could not help but laugh out loud. "Nothing! I think they are some good people, who got screwed. If you do stop by? Please let them know. That we passed along the word that they had open repair bays on our other stops. Besides I was thinking about those field modifications on the Shadow Hawks, ever since I told you about the idea. Endo Steel on some of your machines would be an interesting addition to your product line. That would help with the price of my MMM stock. We have a few more cannons for sale, and we also have a very few surprises that you and your company might be interested in."

The part about the stock price and that he owned some had just jumped to Robert's forebrain. It was a good idea, and he knew what they were planning on selling to MMM and how that might affect the mech sales. That might be a way to get some more C-bills for one Robert Copeland. He would also have to pass that along to SLIC, but it was not likely that they would make him get rid of stock if it was setting in a bank account in the Inner Sphere.

Robert passed over a sheet of paper, which he had in his ship suit's pocket. McDonogh did not pick it up right away. With a few looks to each side of the table. Finally, he reached over and picked it up. This group had already given "surprises" that had gotten his company a few more surprises, that were not so nice or had some very large stingers attached. With a sigh he reached for the pages. As he read the few words, he had to fight to keep his face flat.

Robert smiled as he saw the other man's face change slightly. "I should warn you. You have to be careful, with those things. The heat output is 50 percent higher than the normal Hellstars you make for your MAD-3Rs. If you just replace one of the Hellstars with one of these on your Marauders? That would be a surprise for anyone. If you get some of those Freezers the FedCom is making? You might be able to mount a pair on each, and it would not roast the pilots when they fire both of them off. But you will have to put enough of those Freezers on the damn things. You also might be able to make an updated SHD-2K, that would out Kurita the Kuritas."

McDonogh now was sweating. They spent the next hour talking about things that ranged across a boat load of different topics. They also arranged for a VIP tour of the main manufacturing facility for Robert and his key staff. They did not close any deals at the table. They would wait until Lora could be there to help with any surprises, which were sure to show up.

After Robert and Jess left the Le Chiffre's. They went back to the dropships without making any side trips. Lora was due to meet up with them in less than an hour. When they got out of the taxi, a hover car was parked in what was called the shaded side of the White Rabbit. Robert was worried, because he could not recognize the craft. Other than it was an expensive looking transport, it was an enigma to him. Two of the massive infantry troopers, with sidearms and light body armor, were watching the car from the hatchway of the dropship. That was where Robert saw that Lora was chatting up a third grunt, not far away inside the cargo main hatch.

Lora saw the cute and tall trooper's face go blank and this back went ramrod straight. That was the only hint that she got, that said someone important was coming up behind her. The sound of the drop port had easily drowned out the approach of the taxi. Lora turned in time, to see Robert stepping threw the main cargo hatch. Lora did not have to put a smile on her face, it just was there. She was happy to see them, and not just the man that was leading the small group. She was happy to see more of her people again.

"Captain Copeland, so good to see you again! I hope we can do some more business together while you are on planet." She was staying in the story, just as she thought she should do in a situation like this. Besides she had her reasons.

Robert stopped walking and looked at the woman. He knew that something was wrong. It took him a minute for him to realize it was the tone of voice she had just used. They were friends and that was not a friendly tone, but it was a working tone that he had heard her use before. That was when he saw her tap the little noteputor she always had with her. He had remembered that she had said it was as expensive as it was helpful to her work. Robert's eyes gave her his best "what the frak look" without saying a word.

"Yes, Miss Noone. We did very well together last time. I hope that we can have a repeat of that performance on this trip." Robert was tap dancing and trying to play along with whatever game Lora was playing.

Now Lora was rapidly tapping the thin device, but not touching it with her fingertip. Jess noticed it, and she felt her heart race a little faster. "Miss Noone, you know that we don't let personal electronic devices into any of our meetings. Why don't you leave it with the hatch guard? They will make sure that you retrieve it before you leave." Jess knew that this was not true, but she had also noticed that something was off with Lora tonight.

Lora let out a little bit of breath and nodded her head up and down. She still had a very fake smile on her face as she looked over to Jess. "Oh! That's right! I forgot about that. I will just put it back in my car, I'll be back in a few." She did a little hand wave and exited the dropship hatch heading to the hover car. More than two sets of eyes watched as she went down the cargo ramp and headed for her grounded hover car.

Robert and Jess were still waiting on the inside of the hatch, when Lora came back up the ramp. They went the rest of the way to the meeting room without saying too much to anyone along the way. When Robert took a seat in the briefing room, the Captain of the Blockade Runner was knocking on the hatch before his butt had put a dent into the leather pad of the comfortable chair. "So much for letting me enjoy a little food coma."

"Sir! We have picked up some new friends. It looks to be two groups, again. One group is in one of the warehouses not that far away, and the other one is in a type of hover enclosed cargo van. Both groups are using Star League scouting equipment, not unlike what we saw the last time. We think that we have one larger group, which has split up into two different locations. We also think they are talking to each other while they wait."

Lora was nodding her head up and down, but she still had the frown on her face that she had been sporting after dropping off her data pad. Her voice sounded a little tired when she spoke up. "I'm not surprised. I had some computer issues, and when I took it to a friend. She freaked out. Someone was bugging my little helper. About the only thing she could tell me, was that they "owned" it. I was just carrying it around with me because I did not know what else to do with the damn thing. I only didn't want whoever it was, knowing that I knew about the bug in the first place. Besides I spent too much money on it, to just put it in the recycle bin."

Robert had a poker face on. He looked from Lora back to the ship's Captain. "Okay, keep an eye on them and forward all information to the security squads. Tell them if something happens? I would like one of them alive and talking, but not at the risk of one of our people getting even a hangnail. They are to shoot first, shoot second, shoot third, and then ask questions if anyone is still breathing. Those are the orders of the day." The tone of his voice brought Lora's head up to make eye contact with the man. The tone was one she had heard a few times before, but not from this person. It was more than a little frightening.

Robert took the look and returned it levelly to the local member of the family. She did not ask any questions. He filled the empty air of the briefing room. "Okay, first things first. Lora, what have you got for us? Did you get our HPG message marked Red 6?"

Lora blinked twice and then she got her feet back under her. "Yes, I did. I had no idea that you were out by New Dawn, again?"

Jess smiled and winked one eye at the other woman. "We were not. We were just testing a new toy, and you were the first chance we had to test it. From your statement, I think that it worked as designed. We want certain groups to think, that we were anywhere but where we were, when we sent that missive to you."

Lora had no idea what Jess was talking about, and she doubted that she would ever know. In truth? She did not really want to know. If she did not know? Then she could not tell anyone or let it slip where someone else might hear it, as her bugged device had shown her. There were very few "safe" places for her to speak. She gave herself a mental shake and focused back to business that needed to be done.

"Well after the ComStar freaks, got me off the blackball list. I was able to gather about 40 tons of tools that match what you needed on the last list that you gave me. It comes up to just under two million, in cost. I also found a local buyer, for the Cheetah. She is offering 1.6, but only if it passes a third-party inspection. The price is about what a new one cost, so I think it's a good deal."

Lora was going off of her memory alone, over the last few months. She had been going back to some old school skills her mother had taught her, with only a little bit of very high-tech mixed in. "I know that I told you, that if you give me some time. I could move higher ticket items. The Cheetah sale was one that had come looking for me, after you left. She was pretty let down, when she found out that she had missed you. I checked with her again, when I got your message about you coming back this way. She about kissed me, when I said you were coming back, and that you might have the fighter for sale."

Lora took a sip of the water from a glass on the table. She was about to drop a bombshell on Robert and Jess, and she wanted to savor this moment. "I was able to contact another "Family member". It took some time, but I got a reply to my first attempt to contact some of them. They worked to line up a possible sale of the Merchant class ship, you warned me about. I sent a recheck message, that it was a go and an estimated timeline. It works out better for the sale that it went to Canopus. They will be on Canopus in 60 to 70 days. It would have taken longer for them to come all the way out here, but HPG's are alot faster."

Jess pulled out her thin computer and did some numbers. "Sir that would work. That is about four days after "they" get there. If they don't have any issues, along the way."

Robert nodded his head to what Lora and Jess had said. "Okay, that sounds good. I also need to let you know that we will be opening and leaving open bank accounts from now on with major amounts. High Command does not feel that sending a Mammoth or other larger dropship would be conducive to our people's needs."

Robert knew as soon as the words left his mouth, that he had not been able to bleach the contempt for that decision out of his voice. He was still a little bent out of shape about not getting the larger dropship for this mission. "So instead? We will be using the Mule and making more trips between this part of space and home. That means, that we will not be able to use all of the capital that selling the jumpship and dropship should raise all in one shot. With what we had left over from the last trip, and what we have raised so far on this trip. That means that we have over 50 million C-bills in cash or bank transfer notes of different kinds, to work with already. I want to put over half into the banking system, but I want to keep about 15m in cash like items in my ship's safes. We can use that between stops, that don't have access to an HPG in a timely manner. What do you think, Lora?" Robert and his small staff had learned a few things on the last run, but he wanted to know if a second set of eyes and brains might have a different idea.

Lora was thinking. She was not used to being asked a question like this, but she had been around this type of market for 2 generations. "If you keep a lot of cash on hand? It will get out, to maybe the wrong ears. That much money would draw a lot of attention, by some not so nice people. All who would like to take it off of your hands, and they might not be too worried about leaving a lot of blood on your decks to get at it. After all it's not like you have a battalion or more of armed troops to keep them away."

Robert took in the information, as was his job. "It they want to try something like that? They will not enjoy the experience. Have you been able to set up any other buys, yet?"

Lora knew how to handle this. "Yes, and they will start coming by around 0900. I have already talked to the dropship's Captains and Cargo Masters about it. I have also passed along a list of businesses, that have items you wanted on your updated list. You will have people heading to them tomorrow. MMM put the word out, that they would be actively looking to work with you. It was a few hours after I got your message about being headed this way after your last stop. I think they had a premade press release ready to be sent out, as soon as they got the word. That changed a lot of minds about working with you at the drop of the hat. I know it was support from MMM, that helped me find some of those items you were looking for."

Robert was now all smiles. "That is good work, Lora. You're earning your pay already. Go ahead and make arrangements to have the items you have already picked up shipped to us. I will make sure to let our contact over at MMM know, that we appreciate their help in getting all of us off the local blackball list." Lora already knew about the meeting with the President of the local office of MMM and Robert. Still it would not hurt to let the word float around that Captain Copeland and MMM had truly patched things up.

The meeting went on for some time, as the three worked out a few items. Lora left just as the second moon rose in the night skies, and the second set of crewmembers was heading out to shop in the big city and have some fun. Robert, Jess and escorts went out not long after Lora, spending time and money as they went to all of the local shops in the main shopping and tourist area of Londinium. Jess was asking a lot of questions about how and what to buy. When midnight sounded on the town's massive clock, all of the crews had returned to the grounded dropships.

While the crews of the dropships were settling in for their first night on a new planet, others were not settling in. The two ROM teams of ComStar personnel were keeping an eye on these strangers, very closely. They were collecting data, but bets were being made on when or if, they would be given the word to do something…more active against this group. Both teams had been briefed on the past actions teams' results, or more to the point. The lack of results, that were positive on those last two actions. Each of these two teams thought they would do better, and that somehow the other teams had somehow screwed up the operations. While the ComStar team watched the dropships, the dropship's crew were watching and listening to them.

When the sun came up over the drop port. It was a beehive of activity and the two newest dropships were just as active as everyone else. Outside of the two egg-shaped ships, loaders exited hatches loaded down with cargos of all kinds. Cannons, guns, and a few computers were off loaded and put on display. It would not take long for word to spread, and even people who did not have the money or need would hear about what was going on. They all would stop by to checkout, what everyone on the planet was talking about. On this planet, they did not charge any sales taxes or other fees on weapons made by third parties. In theory, anyone could have bought what was on display. In Theory, that is.

With a major manufacture of battlemechs and combat vehicles in the form of the Pike, Manticore, Po, APCs, and LRM and SRM carriers all on one planet. The total production was not that much compared to New Circe. But when you add that in with all of the skilled techs from around the system and on this planet. It became a major hub of trade, in this part of space. The Captains and the Cargo Masters would alternate closing deals around the two dropships. Soon they were getting to buy some things, to spend the money that was coming in by the bucket loads.

The first purchase was three trailer loads of Fuel Cell powered cars and light trucks. As they were inspected, they were loaded into shipping containers that Robert had used on the last trip. That is if they were not in them already. MMM picked up another three dozen Ultra cannons, and on the side over a dozen H-class Extended Ranged PPCs were stealthily packed away. A few different mercenary units were shopping, but they claimed that they could not afford the price being asked by Copeland's people. By now information about new Star League Tech weapons were in all of the news books, and word said that more and different types were coming out of the factories every month all over the Inner Sphere. The price was just too rich for the units out on the edge of space. That was looking to change soon, but not for right now. The market was still limited, if Robert did not want to blow his cover. He would have to keep the prices on the higher side, to just under insane levels. After all, some units had already been able to scrape the money together.

That afternoon Robert, Jess, and two escorts were given a VIP tour of the MMM Shadow Hawk plant. MMM was very proud of what they could do in that now fully repaired facility. At the edge of the Inner Sphere, it was an impressive site to be able to see in operation. But Robert and Jess had seen the top of the line Star League plants, that the Star League in Exile used and could even reprogram to make different types of war machines as their need or technology changed over the years.

In those types of facilities on New Circe. All you had to do was load those tons of different ores, some of what Robert's ships had brought back. They just needed to be loaded into one end of one of those beasts, in the right openings. Robots would automatically take what was needed to make whatever was planned or programed into the automated factory. And out of the other side would pop out a finished product. In less than a month all of the ores were used up, that Robert had brought back. All to make more new weapons to fight the Cylons.

Jess and Robert smiled and made the right noises, as they were shown around the ancient building. It was during one of the dogs and ponies shows about the base defense, that Jess asked if they were keeping an eye on things going on around the drop port. The briefer stopped her briefing midsentence and looked to one side of the room, at what Robert thought might have been the head of security. Robert knew that Jess had just asked something off of the cuff, but it seemed to have struck a nerve somewhere.

The board but tough looking woman let her eyes narrow as the question sunk in. She was only kind of used to being in this type of show, and she had not been fully paying attention to the proceedings after the first two hours. She knew that this group had been attacked, twice now. "Not normally. Why would you ask that?"

Robert looked at Jess, but it was a valid question and it did not break any of the protocols. He stepped in, to turn the focus to him. "We picked up two teams of people that looked like they were keeping a close eye on us. We had thought, that they might be your people. From your face's expression. I would say that they are not your people after all." Robert had not thought that they were MMM, but he said so to cover up the fact that his people thought that they might be related to ComStar.

The hard-looking woman looked at another suit. and then started to step away from the rest of the group. Just before she exited the room, she called out over her right shoulder. "I will have to send someone to check on that." She was gone out of sight a few seconds later. She was about to kick over some rocks, and she knew right were to start.

While the rest of the tour was wrapping up. The tour guide was let down, that these VIP's were not looking to buy any of the Mechs that she had been showing them for the last few hours. That just did not seem right to her world. She had been warned that these merchants were not the normal group, and they knew what they wanted. More importantly, they would pay for whatever they wanted the second they saw it. They also had things that very powerful people in MMM wanted from them, and they wanted to keep getting stuff from them. She had played nice and done her song and dance, just like she had been asked to do on short notice. Now she was sending them to "The Showroom", via an armored convoy of four cars. She would not think that much more about them by the time she had left for home.

When Jess and Robert showed up to the now familiar looking building. They were met by Dawn again, but this time she was in a lot more expensive dress suit. Instead of the "Normal" show, that she would do for any of her normal clients. She took them right to the items on their wish list or stuff that was close to it. This time she was ready for them, and she was going to make sure that she did not waste anyone's time.

In less than two hours after getting out of the hover convoy. The pair had bought another two-dozen industrial mechs from The Showroom. They ranged from construction, farming, lifting, and moving types of machines. It was not a record-breaking day. But it now made Dawn the number one and number two for the top sells in any given day, as measured over the last century. She was a very happy woman, when Robert and Jess had left the "Showroom". They were again, in the four armored cars supplied by MMM on a high-speed run to the drop port. They cleared the main gate, just as the sun was going down. It had been a very full day for the off-planet group.

It was a repeat of the last night, with small teams of crew going out shopping and doing what people do that have been kept to close together for too long. As the night before, by local midnight. All of the crews were back on the dropships and the ships where locked down for the night. Robert was not sleeping at that time, but he was sitting on the bridge of the White Rabbit. He was watching the two maybe ComStar groups, as they were watching his people. At around 2am things changed, radically. The two attack teams had been warned that they only had about 12 hours before security units from MMM would start looking for them.

With this warning in hand. The local ROM and Com Guard commanders had decided to launch a raid on the smaller of the two dropships, earlier than they had originally planned. That ship had been worked out as being the command ship, for this little group of troublemakers. The plan was to sneak into the blockade runner, kill the command staff, and make it look like a theft of computers and weapons. Then the team would return to the safe house, before they were to start the exfiltration process off of this planet.

The attack was going to go in, led by the sneak suited first group of six personnel. The heavy firepower was going to be provided by six P12 Tornado PA(L). The second team had been able to justify breaking out those very high-tech weapons, after the now two failed attempts of ROM teams. They were waiting for the final word to launch the attack, after the first warning that their cover had been blown. Amazingly they still were not using codes of any kind. Why should they? It was not like anyone had accessed to late Star League tech spying or counter spying equipment.

Robert was on the bridge of the White Rabbit. From the outside, it looked like the dropship's crew was asleep and in darkness. That was far from the truth. The bridges of both ships were fully manned. People were awake, armed and armored. Only the odd one or two of the security detachments were dozing, but even then. Their hands were near weapons. The Radio operator suddenly spins around in her chair, to face the command group.

"The attack word has been given to the two ComStar groups! They reported back that all six Tornados are fully operational, whatever that means. Looks like we might have visitors coming by to do a panty raid tonight."

Robert turned to the Captain of the dropship. "Please pass to the infantry squads on both ships. They are to go to full alert status and deploy to counter the avenues of assault. I want all secondary security personnel armed and armored, but they are to stay in standby locations with weapons locked and loaded. Everyone else is to keep their weapons on safe. This is for both ships, but let the Hobgoblin know that it looks like something is about to happen."

While the orders were given to the security commander on each ship. Robert was checking out the raw data coming into the command center. When the ship's Captain returned to his side, near the center of the command center. Robert was not that well versed in ground combat, but the dropship's Captain had spent a lot of time training with his new crew additions. "So, Captain. Do you think you will be able to track them this time?" Robert was not trying to pull at a scab, but he wanted to know what the other officer was thinking.

The Captain of the White Rabbit was sporting an evil smile, and he was almost dancing on his toes in excitement. "Yes Sir! Most of the time with radar, it is all about the power output. We have had our "Air traffic and Ground traffic" systems on since we landed. We have good data. They are low output devices, but in this case. It's not about the power going out of the dish. It's more about the returned energy, and how you process it. By now we have a very detailed radar map of the local area. As soon as they start moving. We will see them all the way in, as they disturb the existing radar map of the local area."

For the next twenty minutes. All they could do was sit and wait, as a set of 12 people came slowly towards them. Then a shout came from across the room. "Movement! We are picking up movement. Threat count is 6, 8, 12…still climbing. They are 100 feet and closing…slowly."

Robert was almost shocked silent, and then lightening quick. He reacted to the new information being shouted across the room. In a blink of an eye, he was moving and talking. "We did not pick them up sooner?! We did not pick up anything?''

The voice from the radar operator was frantic. He was almost to the point, that he was not getting across the information that he needed to for a few seconds. "Sir! It's not Group 1 or 2. This is a south side contact. The ComStar groups were on the north side of our hull!"

Now the whole bridge was in action, focusing on the new threat. Robert was looking at the updating data. "Contact the Maru. They are to keep an eye on Group 1 and 2. Designate this one Group 3. We are closer and will keep an eye on them."

Robert fully turned to the Rabbit's captain. "Captain, you look to be having some visitors. It's your ship." Robert took three steps to one side. Clearing the view of the main display, for the other man to act or more react to the changing situation. Robert was still close enough that he could keep an eye on the bigger picture. He was surprised how fast things could get out of hand. In space it was a lot harder for you to get a surprise that close to your hull.

The Captain nodded and stepped forward, to show the bridge who was in command now. "Okay, get the infantry squads moving. Looks like they are focusing on personnel access hatch 2B." He stopped talking and looked at the display. He did some math in his head. "Let them know, that it looks like four light infantry squads are on that side of the ship. They are to move their butts and shift that way. Activate the backup squad."

Jacob was moving slow and fast. He was running from cover to cover in a burst of speed no more than five seconds long. He was in first squad, which was also the lead squad for this mission. Bossman had said that the Blockade Runner was carrying a few tens of millions of C-bills, in cash. Their job was to take it tonight, and it didn't matter who got in the way. His crew was made up of 27 others. All of them were specialized in breaking and entering or otherwise stealing valuables from others. A dozen had been the largest crew that he had ever worked with, until tonight.

Jacob was great at breaking into circuits and getting around alarms, and locks. Most of the time. They did not need the full team, but this target was too big and hard for just one team to be positive they could handle the job. The ships were dark, and they should all be getting sleep in their bunks. Drop ports were safe and merchant ships always shutdown for the night, to cut down on operational cost or let their people out to have a little fun on the town. It should be pretty easy to take over this ship. A Mule only had a crew count of about twenty and this ship was a little smaller. That was eight less than this crew that was fully armed, trained, and people used to being able to get violent at the drop of a hat.

Jacob made the last rush, and BANG. He was against the side of the ship. He had his hacking deck out and plugged into and outlet in two eye blinks. The first port was dead, that was not a big surprise. Ships that were up to a few hundred years old, sometimes could not keep all of their systems working like they were new. This was a very good sign for Jacob. He quickly went to the secondary port, in less than two seconds. By that time, a second person had joined him against the metal side of the dropship. He could careless, as he was working on popping the hatch.

Jacob's deck was not as high tech as the one used by ComStar. He would not have known this, at all. He had always assumed, that his device was the best there was in known space. He spent a lot of time and money, to make sure it was the best. Now he was working the device and he did not notice the rest of the world turning around him.

As the time went along. More of the B and E crew made their way to Jacob's location at the side of the spacecraft. Now, what Jacob's device made up for in not being better than the ComStar supplied hardware? It was that his was better in the software that he used to do this kind of job. He used his system often and he had to modify it all the time. Getting this hatch open? He already knew that it was taking a lot longer, than it should have after finding that first dead port.

A very large man slammed into the metal sided ship, but he did not make a sound with the impact. He looked down at the smaller hacker. "Come on little one! Get this egg open." This was said in a harsh whisper, which carried to a dozen different ears.

Jacob did not move his eyes from his device, and his hands were still moving over the keypad. "Don't mess with me when I'm working, or I will tell the Bossman."

He stopped talking, and he bites is lower lip. "This is some crazy stuff. I have never seen or heard of some of these code commands, before. It should not be this hard. Ahh! Here you go." Jacob did an exaggerated hand movement on the keypad, and with the last stroke making an audible click. The sound of the click on the hacking deck was overwritten by a louder click coming from the nearby metal hatch. He had no way to know that it had taken him 40 seconds longer to pop the hatch than the ROM team had needed.

James Olson was a massive man. That was thanks to the genetic engineering done on him and his ancestors by his clan over the generations. He was listed at six foot ten inches tall on his id card. He had only been of average high, in his class at infantry school. He had graduated as the very top person in his class, and he had been put on the list for possible assignment to the Nighthawk unit. This also was a very plum assignment, and he would not be picked for it after all. The change had been after he had been able to pass the test about keeping to a given story, even after a dozen strong drinks. That had moved him into another plum assignment, that was a close rival to the Nighthawk unit.

Now he was on a resupply mission to the Inner Sphere. He had been waiting near the main cargo bay door. He had also been the nearest security person that could shift to the new threat, that had surprised the command deck. He had just set up near a corner with a good view and cover of the access way, which the bridge had said was now at threat. He was wearing heavy body armor that was equal or maybe in some ways a little better. Then what the old SLDF would have used on their average ground infantry unit. It was not "Clan" standard, but it was very good. Everything on his uniform had been based from items of that long-ago era, but two of the weapons he was carrying tonight.

The weapons he was packing were of a Colonial designed and made, high powered counter Cylon rifle. He would have preferred, to have one of the Mausers that a "normal" Wolverine trooper would have been packing. But firing something like that inside a ship? That might have broken something important and killed the whole crew, including one James Olson. The Colonial rifles were firing the more powerful Cylon killing ammunition, and not the counter pirate rounds most of the Rag Tag fleet had access to. He did have to magazines of those hollow point rounds on his gear, just in case. He was expecting that his prey was going to be packing a hard shell, that the Colonial rounds were just made for breaking. At least that was what the math said.

The ammunition had a very high energy burn. That gave the bullet end, an extremely high velocity when it left the muzzle. It was almost double what anything made by the Star League was known to have done. The bullet was also completely different, than anything seen before by most of the rest of the Inner Sphere's militaries. The metal was a little softer, than a modern one made by the "Great Houses" much less what the SLDF could make. That was not the only difference between this, and the other human made weapons.

The bullet, after leaving the barrel would "drop" a bit of itself to lower its mass in flight. The lower mass still had all of the energy of a larger burn provided by the exotic propellant, but now it was lighter and a lot more aerodynamic. It hit its target a lot harder, and then a second charge would activate. The second charge was something that no one in the old Star League had thought to add to each round, that was fired from a rifle.

Each round had a little bit of explosive not far behind the very aerodynamic tips. The idea was that the sharp and fast-moving bullet would punch threw the outer layer of the Centurion type Cylon. Then a microsecond after it had made it through the hard-outer layer? The small explosive charge would detonate inside the machine's hull. It was found that when this type of ammunition was used against "normal" body armor. It would punch threw the heaviest "normal" body armor front plate, and the explosive would go off inside the human body behind those protective plates. It would also push the now tumbling bullet out the back of the body armor at a steep angle.

James Olson was also packing the over and under Colonial pistol on his hip. It was loaded with "normal" Colonial anti pirate rounds in the magazine, but the under barrel was loaded with what was almost a mini grenade to let a downed pilot take out a Cylon. The last weapon was strapped to his back and it was also made by Colonial hands. It was a Blazer rifle, that had been in a shipping crate only a day before. You never know, when you might need some extra firepower. All of those weapons would have overloaded a normal person, but James was not normal. He could not carry this amount of weight forever. He could do it for a few days, if he needed to. And he had done something like that during his primary training, but not forever.

When the hatch James was covering opened into the ship. He planned on giving the person coming in three choices. They could go left, right or straight, after entering the grounded dropship. James found a good spot to cover the straight access way from the hatch. He was the first one of the other crewmembers to make it to this threatened location. He pushes his personnel locator, and then took a standing firing position behind partial cover provided by a ship's bulkhead. He did not have to wait long, maybe one minute and the chain of events gained speed.

In a flash. The hatched popped in and up into its overhead recess. As soon as the hatch was opened. People packing weapons and in black body armor started flooding into the ship. James was watching, and he was impressed at the speed and skill of the attackers. In what seemed like the space of a few heartbeats, a dozen attackers were threw the one hatch. The number was growing almost between eyeblinks. They started flowing down all three access ways as the numbers of intruders kept growing. James sited down the weapon and slowly took the slack out of the trigger of his Colonial made rifle.

Jacob was still connected to the ship's computer, and he was trying to do a little data mining while the rest of the team entered the ship. He about dropped his hacking deck, when shots started to echo out of the metal walled ship. The rush into the dropship had gone down, just like it always had. That is right up until, that odd sounding weapons started up in a thunder blast of sound. Jacob knowingly risks his life, when he leaned over and try to see how things were going inside of the targeted ship. He only saw bodies blown apart for a second or two, before a Colonial made bullet entered his ballistic helmet and popped his head like a dropped water balloon.

This was the first battle that James had been in with him firing Colonial made weapons. It however was not his first battle. He had been trained and used laser-based weapons for over a dozen years. He knew that they only fired once per trigger pull, like how he had this weapon set up. He was firing one round with each pull of the trigger. One part of his brain noted that he was only needing one or maybe two shots, to put down each of the attackers. He was so focused on the fight going on at the end of his muzzle. That he did not notice that fire was coming down the other access ways, or that someone was on the deck by his feet adding their firepower to blunt the attack. He saw a head pop out at the edge of the hatch.

James put a single round into the small exposed target that was standing on the outside of "his" dropship. His weapon made an odd click when he pulled the trigger a second time. That was the only sound to let him know that his weapon's magazine was empty of rounds. He could have reloaded very quickly from one of his ammo pouches, but he chose a different path. He released the weapon and it retracted on its friction straps. He did a motion with his hip and the Blazer rifle shifted from his back into his large hands. He quickly had the heavy weapon up to his shoulder, and it was now in a good firing position.

James pulled the trigger and the twin energy blast went down the access way. In a flash of reaction to the focused light waves, it was turning whatever it touched into hot, expanding gasses. A Blazer rifle was designed to damage mechs, tanks or heavy IFV's. The human body, even one covered in body armor had a different effect. It did not stop a blast. It did take some of the energy, but only enough to clear the path for the rest of the shot.

It was only a bit of harmless light, that made it out the still open hatch way into the dark night of the drop port. The six bodies between James and the hatch way had a nice double fist sized hole punched threw them all. One part of James noticed that most of them were only covered in heavy leather clothes for protection. Only the first few had "real" body armor of any value.

While the bodies were still falling to the dropships deck plates, outside of the ship. The man called Bossman noticed the flash of lights from his vantage point, coming out of the personnel hatch. He was about 100 feet away from the dropship hatch. Bossman knew that something was wrong, he could feel it. He reached with one hand and pushed a button on his helmet near his ear. "This is Bossman! Pull back! Everyone Pull Back! This is blown! Pull back now!"

Bossman started putting his own orders, into action. He started to put some distance between him and his would-be payday. He made it to the half-hidden 8x8 van, which was the escape plan if things went wrong. Bossman took a second to look over his shoulder, before he opened the long sliding door on one side of the large cargo van. He could count six of his people that had exited the dropship, which had to have been a trap. He made a mental pledge that he would find out who had set him up. He already had a short list of people who could have pulled off an ambush like this on his people. He would be going down that list as methodically as he could, later. Now all he had to do was get all of the way out of the ambush.

By the time that he had gotten the large wheeled van started, the rest of his team made it to the van. One look out of the back window, showed him that there were only bodies on the ground after the sixth person had hopped into the box shaped 8x8 van. He had started this job with 28 people, now it looked like he had seven left. He was not going to stick around, and he started moving his van. If anyone else made it out of the trap? They would meetup at the safe house, later. When the van started to slide around the building corner, he looked into the main cabin. The wounds on three of the survivors were looking like they might not live out the next few hours. That was both good and bad news, in Bossman's mind. Fewer survivors meant fewer people to challenge his side of the story, and fewer people to pay.

As the lightly armored van started to move to clear the warehouse. It was blown apart, as it came into view of the taller dropships. A pair of large lasers and fifteen rockets from a twenty pack LRM fired from the Trojan class ship went into the van. They struck the still slowly moving and solid walled van, almost at the same time. It just came apart under the hammer blows that would have staggered a battlemech. Parts of van and bio matter were still landing, when the local law enforcement showed up to the site of all the action. It did not take them long, to trace where the attacker had gone wrong. They followed the evidence all the way back to their staging area of the would-be robbers. It was filled with items that had been left behind, like food wrappers and human waste.

The woman in charge of the ComStar groups was only about two minutes away, from radioing back to her boss that they were about to launch the attack onto the dropships. She had stopped dead in her tracks. It had been when her point ground team stopped, after they also had picked up movement at the base of their target. At first, she was mad that someone was poaching her target. Then the gunfire started, and she was not that upset about the poaching.

Both ComStar teams recorded what they could. The only real facts that they had. It was that a light infantry unit had attacked the dropship, and they had not come out the better for it. When the heavy weapons had fired into a moving Van? She had decided it was time to move out, but back towards their base in the ComStar compound.

Her line of thinking was that it would not take long, for the MMM security people to find out about their planned attack. Then it would be only a matter of minutes, before they passed along that information about them to the local law enforcement types. They were on the road after they had finished "cleaning" their hiding areas. When inspectors came to these areas looking for clues? They found none, but a few scuff marks. That had only led to more questions, and kept people looking to find out what really had been going on that night.

This attack? It was the first known "major" attack or attempted theft, in almost a decade. It made the news both in the attack and the number of bodies that would have to be put in the ground by the local law enforcement agencies. With it being a crime scene, and not an "attack" by some hostile forces. The bodies had to be moved to the police-and custom's-controlled area of the spaceport. It was a little over filled, by the twenty mostly complete bodies, which they were trying to identify. Robert was not even asked to stick around for any questions. It was very obvious that he and his people where the would-be victims tonight. When it was time for the landing and sale of the 25ton F-10 Cheetah? They were still putting bodies in body bags around the dropship. It would seem that the local law enforcement was not ready for a mass casualty event.

Robert was outside when the first deliveries started to show up to the cargo ships. Robert had no problem telling people what had happened, during the early hours of the morning. He was using it as a warning, and he wanted to get the word out to the rest of the planet. That if you mess with his people? You had better bring your lunch and a whole lot of help. At 0900. The skies over the drop port were cut with a sonic boom. It was the Cheetah coming in for a landing. It would be parked nearby in the shadow of the Lisbon Maru, for now.

The new would be owner and a set of four techs showed up around a half hour later. Robert had wanted to be there, but he had to deal with a supplier. One that had decided she wanted to play games with them, even after all of the warnings. Jess was taking the lead with Lora as back up on the sale of the light fighter. The inspection should have only taken a few hours, but Robert had his people open parts of the fighter craft to help to speed the inspection along before the group of techs had shown up.

Rebeca was talking with the group of techs that she had hired to check out the light class fighter. The oldest tech was using a lot of hand motions to "talk" to the rest of his team, but Rebeca could not hear most of what was being said at this distance. She knew, what most of those hand motions meant. She turned and walked back to Jess and Lora, and her head was shaking as she walked. But she had a smile plastered on her face.

Jess took a half step forward and to one side to be closer to the other woman. "So? I take it that the fighter is as described?"

Rebeca let the smile get bigger on her narrow face. "I'm just glad, that I locked in the price before you came back. The tech I hired. He wants to buy it instead of letting me have it. They said that it's the best maintained Cheetah that they have ever seen. I'm ready to transfer the funds, whenever you're ready. I am just glad, that you did not want to delay the inspection after what happened last night." Rebeca had seen the morning news with her morning coffee, and she was hoping to see if she could pick up any good rumors.

Jess was wondering about something herself. Something was off, but she could not put her finger on it. After what happened last night? She felt it was okay to be a little rude, to the person that was about to hand over a million and a half C-bills.

"I'm glad you like the fighter, and making money is kind of in our business model. I was also wondering about something. Why would you be actively seeking out a predominately FWL light fighter to buy?"

Rebeca was a little taken aback by the question. It was rather personal, but then again. It was odd, even out here on the edge of mapped space. She relented, after all she had just asked a shady question herself. Maybe they were a little on edge, and after all. She would have been a little on edge. If a special forces platoon had just tried to take my ride home. That was how she was reading between the lines of all of the reports, that she had read and seen before coming over.

"I had mine blown out from under me, almost three years ago. Now the why? My sister and I are originally from the FWL. She is still working on planet. But in order to get a decent job? You need to be a lance. You can mix and match aero fighters, but it's not a good idea for the long term. Now, all I have to do is keep Kim from wanting to trade fighters on me." She was already picturing what the new paint job was going to look like on her new ride, and it looked awesome in her mind.

Jess, who had three older siblings, and very much understood the last part. "Good luck with that. Here is our account number."

Jess passed over a number, and the mid-twenties maybe pilot took the slip of paper with very steady hands. In less than a minute. It was all done, and half an hour after that. An aircraft tug was moving the light class fighter to its new home some dozen miles away. The sale and the movement of the fighter was picked up by a few of the news crews, which had been drawn to the alert on the law enforcement network.

The crews of the Styx, and Hobgoblin, would soon be very happy at the sale of the craft. They were losing a 25ton third line, at best light fighter, for a rebuilt 65ton SLDF fighter. It was a marked increase in armor and firepower for fleet defense, even if it was a lot slower than the light fighter had been. The SLDF in Exile would also be very happy not to have to worry about supplying the one-off fighter with parts and pilot training, when they got back home again. That alone would have value to the SLDF Navy, besides the sale price

The rest of the stay on planet was not eventful. About the only thing that could be seen as having changed over the last day. It was that now MMM or a Mercenary unit was always actively patrolling around the drop port in lance strength or larger. What was not seen, by most people, were the dozens of new observation points armed and always manned. It was just another day at a drop port, and it was business as usual on the outside.

The last things to be loaded onto the pair of dropships, were the fresh food and the four dropship engines that had been purchased from MMM. They would need the supplies for the next leg of this run. Those two types of supplies were joined with over 2,000 tons of items that were needed back home, that were picked up by the various buyers. Robert's crew had done very well for themselves.

Robert had a private meeting with Lora. He outlined the orders he had been given about finding out information on someone. It had taken her a day to work out what to do. As it turned out there were groups of mercenaries that could do this type of work. She would contact a cutout, and within two to three weeks. That recruiter would hire a unit to start watching a certain Ngo connected to Kowloon. It was not going to be cheap, and the contract was going to need to be renewed every year. But Robert and SLIC had expected this, and at least one of them had planned accordingly.

When the two dropships lifted off, again. It was a well watched event, if not a newsworthy event. This time Robert had put out, to anyone that asked. That they were going to Canopus as their next major stop. He also told anyone who asked, that they were not taking any hitchhikers. And they were not posting their detailed flight plans between systems that would end at the MC capital. Where they were going to be stopping next? That was not of any importance to the people in this system. That was how Robert addressed the questions, when asked time after time.

When word made it back to the planet's main MMM headquarters, where the next major stop was going to be for a certain jumpship. Quickly it was decided that some messages should be passed along, to warn their partners on the capital planet of the Magistracy of Canopus. Detailed reports would be written up with a new set of double coded keys, before they were sent out on the HPG network. Those messages would be sent out not long after the two cargo ships had left the atmosphere of the planet.

MMM was not the only group watching the two dropships launching today. The entire leadership of the local ComStar compound, was now interested in this group. With the number of Star League tech weapons, the used weapons, were not of that much importance. This bit of information had now been confirmed by their spies working within the local MMM facility. They had thrown out one of the ROM assets, to find out where they were getting what they were selling. It had been feared that somehow, Copeland had found an operational factory for the making of new ultra-cannons. Now that was not an issue. If they were selling used weapons? Then they would run out of those weapons sooner or later. ComStar like to train their people in thinking long term.

The new rifles and pistols were strange, but of limited use in the bigger picture of the rest of the Inner Sphere. They were even at a lower tech level than could be made out here, at the edge of the Inner Sphere. That was making this brain trust still think, that this company had just found a lost colony that wanted to be left alone. This world might be what had remained of a hidden Rim World. It would be filled with refugees that did not want to be found, because of the history it might have. This was something that ComStar had found before, and most of the puzzle pieces fit that data model. They knew how to handle that data model.

What was causing the issues? It was that they had stood up to the great ComStar and the word of Blake, and those computers they kept showing up with. On that first trip? They had counted them selling over 75 of those powerful but small machines, to any barbarians that had a few coins to rub together. Now they had more, and it looked like it might be as many as a few hundred of those powerful computers coming onto the market.

In the bigger picture? A few hundred new computers were not a showstopper, when it was spread out over the thousands of inhabited planets around the Inner Sphere. It was just a tiny drop in the bucket. They might last twenty to thirty years, before they would be just more junk sitting in a garbage pit somewhere. ComStar was looking long term, to very long term as a rule. They just needed to make sure, that those new systems did not somehow kick off any new innovations or add to the rate that the Helm's core had already started. They needed to know more information, and they needed it badly. They also needed to make sure that no one found out about how this spec of paint had stood up to them.

It was the main working idea that was causing some sleepless nights, for some high ranked members of that organization. That they might have more of those computers, lots more and maybe ones that were more powerful than what had hit the market already. Some that might be so powerful? That ComStar could not compete against them on the open, or on the dark market of passing favors and the odd few trinkets.

That idea was terrifying to higher leadership, as the news went higher up the food chain of ROM and getting closer to Terra with each passing of an updated report. Word had been sent to ROM's main office for the whole area, when Copeland and his people had entered this system. Now they were sending a message that he was heading their way, via a route that was not published to even to Dunianshire's traffic control. It was now their responsibility, to handle this little group of troublemakers after they had left this star system.

Wolfnet was interested also in Copeland and his traveling company, by the time that Robert had reach the jump point. Mainly it was because Rom of ComStar seemed to have it in for them. Anyone that ComStar might have a mad on about, was someone that the Wolf's Dragoons might want to watch a little closer. It was a very low priority report, which would not be seen on Outreach for months after this one domino had fallen.

Even then? The Dragoons were too busy rebuilding and updating their war-machines with the limited amounts of clan tech they had in storage, or that they could make more or less by hand. They knew the Clans were returning, soon. About the only note of interest, that made it to any high level of leadership? It was that Copeland and company might be useful as a source of additional supply of Star League weapons. Weapons that could be sent to some other units around the Sphere. Ones that were friendly with them, but ones that they did not trust to work directly with the Wolf's Dragoons people in shoulder to shoulder combat.

They had their own factories making new items as fast as they could, for their own use in the coming war. Maybe if Wolfnet had been a little less overworked for the last few years. Those reports might have been looked at a little closer, but Wolfnet generated tens of thousands of reports every day. The term is information overload, and it had been a problem for Intelligence people for centuries. Sometimes you just missed the golden nugget, no matter how hard you were looking for it. Then your boss would point it out to you, thanks to 20/20 hindsight.

Notes:

Wolf's Dragoons and weapons. They were building as much clan tech as they could, and they still did not field enough for everyone. They still had to make late Level 2 tech for their own mechs, fighters, and dropships. Look at the light fusion engine (LFE). They had to spend resources to develop the things, because they could not make enough Clan tech XLs.

ComStar and Criminals. Not only ComStar was looking to have a payday. I think some might have forgotten about the first masterminds to do some B and E, but Copeland had left before they could make a plan much less execute one. Yes, ComStar miss counted the number of Computers and other things that had been sold. The B and E team overestimated the amount of cash on the dropships. There is no such thing as perfect intelligence, unless you have a working crystal ball.

There are many types of Mercenaries. We know they have mercenary units that specialize in many different types of work. Why not data miners and Intel people? How to hire one? The same way some small power hires a mech company to help rebel against an overlord or to set up a garrison contract, a third party. And yes, there are risks doing something like that.