Malmsteen: "Sir, permission to leave Castle Raynor, take my men and go do something."
Raynor: "You know you don't need to be that formal with me right? I mean we talked about this."
Malmsteen: "Yes, but now that we're presenting a slightly more formal front to groups that we may negotiate with rather than just shooting, I thought it better to stand a bit more on ceremony. Regardless, my request?"
Raynor: "I mean, sure, but what's the matter? Thought you liked running tac simulations and teaching classes."
Malmsteen: "I do, but it's been over a year, Commander Raynor. I've worked my way through every tac sim available, ran out, made some new ones and worked through those as well. And while they're not as good at it as Corrington or I, the first classes have graduated into a fairly capable officer corps - they won't be pulling any particularly daring maneuvers, but they won't cock things up either despite ostensibly holding advantages. They have been given a very thorough book from which they can draw from, and they won't deviate from it until they've gotten some real experience under their belt."
Raynor: "Hm... I don't quite like the idea of making cookie-cutter officers like that. Why not encourage a bit more initiative?"
Malmsteen: "High-risk, high-reward personalities are valuable when you're fighting from a position of weakness. You have to take gambles to win when playing it safe just means getting ground down. But we're not weak here, Commander - far from it, I've run numbers and if we had our fleet fully ready when we'd arrived, we probably could have... well, perhaps not conquered the Sphere outright given the lack of manpower to hold ground, but certainly we could have forced the Great Houses into whatever terms we wished. Even without our overwhelming advantage in naval power, it would take staggering amounts of House military forces to overcome us - enough that we could cripple any one House due to their inability to mobilize those kinds of forces without catastrophically compromising their defensive lines against their neighbors. ...well, regardless - the officers I've trained won't win any glorious, daring victories, but they won't throw away surefire wins because of stupid risks either - they'll be dependable. We'll be able to rely on them to win against weaker forces, which is most of them, and hold out well against stronger ones until reinforcements arrive."
Raynor: "Fair enough, I suppose. Anyway, what would you even do? We're not at war with anyone - well, not at war with anyone that needs you."
Malmsteen: "I was considering taking one of our Battlecruisers, some of my mercenaries and going out to be mercenaries. To be frank, we need more data, and traders aren't getting us enough - the more Battleroms we can pull from for our Adjutants, the better, especially since I've forwarded a request to Swann."
Raynor: "Yeah, I heard about that - bit of a different tack from how the locals do it, huh?"
Malmsteen: "Current combat computers rely on just identifying a Mech's make - whether something is a Warhammer, an Archer, a Wolverine, or something or other. But that's not reliable - due to the nature of the Sphere, you can't expect those Mechs to fit their standard loadouts - that Archer might have replaced an LRM-15 with an AC/10 for example. So instead having our tactical aids identify things like Mech engine types, weapons systems, and the like will be more useful - knowing what a Mech is called doesn't matter, knowing what it can do does."
Malmsteen: "And to make something like that and have it be reliable we'll need... well, a lot of data. Both what we see ourselves, and what we can pull from enemy Mechs."
Raynor: "Well, might not be a Battlecruiser but once we've got a spare ship operational I'll hand it over - heh, I do owe you one after all, after Haven."
Malmsteen: "You paid for our services, and that includes the ability to use our assets as you need. That was just cost of business, and my ship was kind of outdated anyway... that being said, once we've kicked in Mengsk's teeth I'd be very appreciative if you let me take some of those Minotaurs."
Raynor: "Hah. We'll see - though I have to ask, Malmsteen, what sort of tac-sims have you run?"
Malmsteen: "Everything up to and including the SLDF coming back from the Deep Periphery, having restocked, replenished, and developed stronger war machines, uniting the Great Houses and declaring total war on us, the bulk chaff armies of the Sphere reinforced by the advanced and well-led, well-trained armies of the SLDF utilizing more advanced strategems, backed up by not only the raw industrial might of the Sphere but also whatever territories the SLDF claimed out in the Deep Periphery."
Raynor: "Yeah, you've been in there too long."
Kamea disliked this 'Captain'.
It was illogical, there was no reason to do so, indeed the man had done them excellent service – not just House Arano, but the entirety of the Reach. He had been utterly professional, loyal, and had provided excellent work.
But for all that she disliked the man, though perhaps 'disliked' wasn't quite the right word. 'Distrust' fit better – namely because whoever these men were, they were not mercenaries. Markhan and his XO agreed – these men weren't even bothering to really pretend to be soldiers-of-fortune, which meant that their activities had some kind of ulterior motive. One that she simply couldn't figure out.
Rumors could travel slowly in the Periphery, what with the lack of interstellar travel, yet even they in the Reach had gotten word of these mysterious newcomers – the first rumors had begun when the minor worlds closer to the Concordat reported a distinct lack of pirate activity. As if someone was making a concerted effort to wipe out pirates in the region.
Yet the open contracts in the MRB offices languished, no one stepping forth to claim those bounties, and none of the great powers in the region were mobilizing their forces in a way that spoke to it. It wasn't as if you could really hide the movement of something like an entire RCT after all. And when interested parties had gone in to investigate, all they found were destroyed buildings, the burnt-out husks of machines too damaged to be worth salvaging even for spare parts and the odd corpses that had killed with what may have been mech-scale machineguns perhaps going by the state of the remains.
They came, they killed, they left – and even the Minnesota Tribe, one of the great enduring mysteries of the galaxy, had left corpses behind. It was as if these mysterious agents were ghosts, killing with impunity and then leaving without leaving a trace behind – if they were taking losses, then they were taking their bodies with them, and try as anybody might they could never find a survivor to speak of what had happened, what terror had come down to smite them.
If it had been burning colonies being left behind, there would have been panic and fear at such thorough, ruthless, efficient killers – but as the victims were pirates, the most that she and those around her had felt had been perhaps a sense of unease at the unknown.
Merciless pirates were an evil, yes, but a known one – these agents, whoever they were, their motives seemed to be a mystery. It was as if all they were interested in was in killing pirates and taking every scrap of salvage they had. Even the jumpship crews could say nothing, even as the void of pirate activity grew and grew, like a long snake slowly making its way towards Aurigan space.
Many governments were happy to get these services for nothing, but some others had tried to put out feelers to try and hire these mysterious MechWarriors, because a force this capable couldn't be left alone. It had to be put to use against their rivals, whoever those rivals may be. But nothing – attempts to track them down and contact them in-person were fruitless, and attempts to hire them directly went ignored.
So her father had tried a different tack – these men seemed to be more interested in salvage than C-Bills, so he had posted a contract that most mercenaries wouldn't bother with. One to wipe out an entire pirate base that had been identified near the edges of Aurigan space, offering acceptable salvage terms but C-Bill payments far below market rate. He had been warned by the MRB that such a contract would most likely languish, but he had persisted, and the bait had been taken.
That was how they had first made contact with the man – simply referring to himself as 'Captain Malmsteen'. After setting the bait, they had made to move into position – yet by the time they arrived, it had been almost too late. The bulk of their forces had already moved onto their Dropships – massive things, of a design that was completely alien to the region. Hell, potentially completely alien to the Sphere – the things were more like giant aerodynes than the standard spheroid designs most used.
They had already packed up most of their Mechs as well, only a small number of security ultralights visible while the last of their tanks were being driven aboard. Another five minutes and they would have been gone, leaving behind their characteristic 'tails' of mangled corpses and ruined metal.
But they had gotten there before they had left, so her father had rushed out a comm signal as fast as he could towards them before they took off.
The man, the 'Captain', the commander of this company… applauded them, when he opened communications. He had known the mission was bait to try and lure his company out, but had taken it anyway to see if the trappers could pounce on him before he left. His praise had been genuine, she could tell, but the way he acted… her father might not have been the master of a Great House, or even on the same level as the Calderons, but he was still the head of House Arano, leader of the Aurigan Reach. A man to be afforded the respect of an established noble.
Yet this nameless 'mercenary' had acted as if it were his right to 'test' her father, to play a 'game' with him and see if he could arrive before they had left.
Negotiations had been short and brief – the man had quite calmly stated that he and his men were handling their own affairs, but if House Arano wished to make use of their services… then rather than bother with contracts, they ought to simply point them towards pirates and raiders, and let them loose.
Her father had taken the complete denial of any negotiation with good grace, and had agreed to his terms – after all, the reason why this pirate base, and others like it, continued to exist was because the Aurigan Reach simply couldn't coordinate the forces necessary between its constituent Houses to crush them all. The balance of power was ordinarily far in favor of the House, not the mercenary, yet with the swiftness with which these men had destroyed this base so utterly… House Arano would not emerge unscathed if hostilities erupted.
While it was a blow to their armories that these men were both thorough salvagers and utterly uncaring of the damage they dealt to the Mechs and weapons the pirates used, House Arano's coffers were untouched as they continued wiping out pirate base after pirate base, strangling the Aurigan pirates ruthlessly. In every sense that mattered, these mysterious soldiers were a boon to the region. With new pirates now lacking safe havens to put roots down in, the Reach could benefit for decades just from what they had done thus far as trade flourished without fear.
Now her father was considering giving them one of House Arano's most closely-guarded secrets, and siccing them on the pirate queen 'Grim Sybil'.
But she couldn't help but worry – these men had done good work thus far, yes, but they clearly had their own aims. For all the good they had done wiping out pirates, it hadn't just been out of altruism – outside of whatever aims they were pursuing on their own, they had most likely obtained considerable amounts of salvage. And while her father was confident that they couldn't just steal the Argo… what if they sold that information to others? What if they destroyed it? What if they plundered it irreversibly, leaving it a ruined husk that would never fly again?
And on a personal level… the man had frightened her, somewhat. Kamea was a Mechwarrior, and when they had first met in-person on that ruined pirate base, the man had only been flanked by two of those odd ultralights and a pair of tanks, alongside a number of soldiers in armored bodysuits of some kind. The man himself, walking out on foot.
The Arano delegation by contrast had had a full lance of Mechwarriors. Yet when they had met, despite the fact that she towered over him in her Kintaro, she had felt almost small as he looked up at her. As if he were the one with power in this situation, not her – as if her Mech was just a toy, its presence a non-factor to the result of any potential hostilities that might erupt. A sort of calm, self-assured amusement visible on his face as she opened up negotiations before her father took over. A single pull of the trigger and his entire delegation would have been killed by her SRM's, yet he didn't seem to register it as a threat at all.
No man should have been so utterly calm in such a tense situation, especially when at such a disadvantage.
Ultimately, she trusted her father to do what was right, but in this she couldn't help but wish that Lord Espinosa could be read into the full situation. He was aware of these men, of course, all the Houses of the Reach were, but he simply wished to make use of them to wipe out the pirates that had been plaguing the region for so long before sending them on their way. He wasn't planning to potentially involve them in the highest and most well-kept secrets they had to offer. The man had a natural caution and cunning that perhaps could have helped here, to temper her father's regards towards this 'Captain'.
In the end she would trust her father, but she would be keeping a close eye on this man, and asking Markham and Raju to do the same.
House Lord Santiago Espinosa sighed as he leaned back in his chair, his desk covered in various reports from his spies and informants all across Aurigan space, and even reaching out into the Taurian Concordat. Their neighbors might have been larger and far mightier, but the bull was oh-so easy to lead around by the horns if you were just a little clever and a little careful.
Of course being so small that the Taurians rightfully didn't consider them an actual threat also helped – a fact that he was quite honestly fine with. A part of him did wish the Aurigan Coalition to be a strong, powerful state equal to the Concordat, or even one of the Great Houses, but he knew that was an impossibility – even if their neighbors ignored their efforts in building themselves up, trying to find and colonize new worlds, and didn't just smash them outright once they were a prize worth taking, the Founding Council would kill any such effort before it ever got off the ground.
Just thinking about the hypothetical arguments in such a circumstance – who would get what planet, who would get the most support for their initiatives, the endless politics and arguments and jockeying – was enough to give him a migraine just considering it.
Regardless, if they couldn't be strong, then better to be unnoticed – to be beneath the notice of the great powers, quietly living their lives in the shadows of the strong. To be just strong enough that taking them would be more trouble than it was worth.
But now opportunity had come, but he couldn't tell whether it could catapult the Aurigan Reach into the heights of prosperity forever – or at least the next dozen generations – or whether this could potentially spell its doom as they were drawn into the growing storm by House Davion's borders.
Even before these newcomers, this 'Captain Malmsteen', had arrived he had been hearing rumors – increased trade near the Taurian-Federated border, more and more independent merchants making their trips to a world that he had never heard before; Dumassas. Merchants seeking to make a fortune by trading for a wondrous trove of first he had dismissed them – perhaps Dumassas had uncovered some Star League cache and was selling the Lostech there, or perhaps these rumors were just completely unsubstantiated and people had defaulted to Lostech.
But the rumors didn't die. They just persisted, and grew, and grew as the trade didn't die down – and as they persisted, his interest grew. Apparently there was something more to Dumassas than just a one-off economic boon courtesy of a lost Star League cache – perhaps they'd gotten a factory working, but with the spotty intelligence he was receiving it was impossible to tell what was fiction from what was fact.
He had resigned himself to languishing in ignorance as those fortunate enough to be nearby or had greater power than the Reach investigated the region… and then Captain Malmsteen had arrived, having carved a trail of targeted slaughter across the border between the Sun and the Bull.
They were clearly from Dumassas, that much was clear – the trail of their movements started out relatively near the world, and while it was possible that they were unrelated he somehow doubted it. Occam's razor and all that – besides, it made sense once you put the pieces together.
These men were primarily after salvage, not C-bills – the only machines they left behind were those reduced to utter scraps, completely unsalvageable, the only worth they had left being their raw metal value. Anything else – from tanks to Mechs to turret systems – they were all being taken, even if many of those machines were probably in such poor condition that only a dedicated factory could restore them to life.
He doubted that those dropships had the capacity… but if they were from Dumassas, then they could simply be funneling that salvage back towards the world.
He had to praise Tamati for being clever enough to actually just give these men what they were looking for while trying to make a connection with them – but it was also rather frustrating, because the Council was taking the absolute wrong lessons from the entire mess as well. Rather than take it as a welcome reprieve to organize a more central authority without an axe hanging over all their heads, his attempts to push for concentration of power were nearly dead in the water now without that incentive. Idiots and fools – just because they had been fortunate once, didn't mean they would be fortunate again.
Still, Tamati clearly was focusing on what was important, so he would let the 'Head' of the Aurigan Coalition exercise what little authority he was willing to while pushing his lifelong agenda and trying to make sure the Taurians didn't exploit their disunity.
In an ideal world these newcomers would throw their support behind him since if Tamati didn't at least listen to their words after everything they had done for him he would eat his house flag, but what were the chances that these friendly, marauding mercenaries would agree that a strong, central authority was what was needed for the Aurigan Coalition? Mercenaries thrived off of the instability caused by a lack of it.
If he got the chance he would raise the topic, of course, but he doubted anything would come of it.
High Lord Tamati Arano II, First Amongst Equals of the Founding Council, was nervous.
Soon, he would be meeting this 'Captain Malmsteen' – not using intermediaries such as his daughter, but rather meeting the man himself. Remotely, admittedly, but it would still be a face to face conversation.
Normally this wouldn't be cause for a man in his position to be nervous, but when the topic of discussion would be House Arano's most closely guarded secret, finally breaking open that treasure trove after his forebears had kept it secret their entire lives had him on tenterhooks.
Kamea didn't agree with his decision, to use these mercenaries as catspaws, but his daughter could be shortsighted at times – well-meaning and valiant, but a bit naive as to political realities.
Frankly, the Aurigan military could have taken Grim Sybil's base at any time – that was never the problem. The problem had always been that there were more pressing concerns – the endless stream of oddly well-equipped pirates that the region had to deal with, border pressures with the Concordat, and the fact that the key to the treasure trove, the Argo, lay outside of Aurigan space. The Founding Council couldn't even agree on a unified anti-piracy movement, they would simply never agree to military adventurism outside their borders to destroy one of the many pirate bands that existed in the galaxy.
And then Captain Malmsteen had arrived, tearing up many old plans with his activities and providing a wealth of new opportunities for those who could play his game.
Kamea was concerned about the amounts of salvage they were undoubtedly gaining, and the idea of putting them so close to the Argo for them to potential steal, but she hadn't put the pieces she did have together.
These men were taking extreme pains to hide themselves – even operating outside of Comstar's channels whenever they could. They hid their operations, they hid their movements, they hid everything – and you didn't go to this much effort to hide things about yourself if you didn't have things to hide.
Santiago believed them to be hiding regiments of Battlemechs, lost Star League weapons from Dumassas and sending the ruined machines they made back to the far-off world for repair in some restored factory, but Tamati wasn't so sure. Those were a known quantity – and if they'd had those things, they could have easily followed in the footsteps of the Wolf's Dragoons and entered the Sphere. There would be no need for them to be slumming it around out here.
Furthermore, those Dropships weren't of a design that he recognized – and, given by how they operated, didn't seem to be meant for hauling Battlemechs. If he had to make a guess, they were converted cargo freighters – flexible dropships, but not incredibly specialized towards supporting a particular class of 'cargo'.
That was the hint, really – he didn't recognize the Dropships, and Kamea hadn't recognized the tanks. Nor had Markham or Raju. Tanks, dropships, technology that they didn't recognize – and if the efforts they were going to to keep things a secret were any indication, they had a lot more in the way of mysterious technologies.
The thoroughess and indiscriminate nature of their salvage was the nail in the coffin in his suspicions – they weren't interested in C-Bills, but they were interested in studying the technology that the Periphery had to offer. The designs, the computers, anything and everything about them – they would scramble to take them with a thoroughness that beggared belief.
No, Captain Malmsteen didn't have a connection to a Star League base to offer, nor regiments of mechs.
He had something far more valuable – a connection to a potentially completely new technology base.
To be frank, even if they somehow managed to take the secrets of the Argo, if that was enough to convince the man to work together with them on a more regular basis he would consider that a worthy trade. He wasn't entirely convinced that was a risk, though – the Argo's secrets would be encrypted with the best protections Star League could have mustered, and he doubted they would be able to crack them without the help of himself and Lord Karosas. Or, crack them in a timely manner at least.
And of course that was all planning for the worst-case scenario, which despite how often it happened wasn't actually a universal law that would occur. If the man was willing to cooperate, then the Aurigan Coalition could cement itself in the region for… well, not forever perhaps, but certainly long past his death. It could usher in an era of peace and prosperity for his people, using these potential new technologies and the Argo's profits to both empower the Reach against pirates and raiders while also strengthening relations with their larger, far more powerful neighbors, securing their safety and stability against both those who would crush them from above and those who would gnaw at them from below.
He wished he could read Lord Espinosa into the secret as well, but to be frank while the man was reliable in a way that many of the other members of the Founding Council weren't, he also wasn't an Arano, and Tamati simply wasn't sure if he could trust him enough. Especially for something like this.
Besides, there was no way to know if this treasure trove had already been plundered or not, or whether it was ever full to begin with – the Argo's systems had been devised before the Amaris War, and many lost caches had been plundered by the SLDF or looters in the frenzy.
No, better to let Santiago continue to entreat with the Taurians, keep them placated and calm. Most SLDF Caches would have been set near the borders of the Concordat, to keep the unruly people of that region in line – if the Argo could lead them to any, it would most likely be near that border. When that time came, keeping the Taurians from knowing what they were doing until they were in a strong position would be critical.
For now, he would focus on the much longer-term – the realm of grand plans and fanciful designs. Santiago was better concentrating on more grounded, immediate concerns.
Pinging Follower38 for a threadmark, since discussion slowed down somewhat decided to begin moving my material on over.