----- Six Weeks Later -----
Date: June 29, 2820
Location: Mozirje
Title: The Mozirje Experiment!
Authors: John Stephenson and Pat Zircher
Type: Graphic Novel
Synopsis: The story opens with Captain Gideon Frost sitting in the ravaged hulk of his Crusader and dictating a log entry. He reports his lancemates Loeb and Roger killed in action.
He recounts that his lance arrived aboard the LCS Sphinx (a spheroid DropShip carried by a WarShip of an unidentified class) and landed on the perimeter of a Kurita compound on Mozirje's surface. The lance is understrength, having left Gene back on Devin to recover from injuries sustained in his struggle with the Kurita assassin. Although Frost's lance was preparing to use Wasps on Devin, the lance deploys with a Crusader (Frost), a Locust (Roger), and a Wasp (Loeb). (Perhaps some of the toppled Wasps were too damaged to use on short notice.)
As they approach the compound, they come under artillery fire, and the Crusader responds with an LRM barrage. At the Kurita base, a Sho-i (ensign) complains to Dai-i (Lt. Commander) Yoshikawa that the experiment could be ruined if the Steiner 'Mechs aren't stopped. Yoshikawa orders the research station's four Land-Air 'Mechs (LAMs) to engage.
Shen Lung Flight (four Stinger LAMs) launches as Frost's lance reduces the Kurita installation's defenses to flaming rubble and tears open the wall. Loeb points his Wasp's rifle at the DCMS officers inside, and demands their surrender. When Yoshikawa refuses, Loeb guns the entire research team down. Frost dismounts and explores the wrecked lab, finding frigidraulic fluid (used to coat heat sinks) in plasma bottles.
Outside, Roger and Loeb engage the attacking LAMs. Roger's Locust take out two while Loeb's Wasp is overheated from his massacre of the scientists. A third LAM executes a kamikaze strike, sending both the Locust and the LAM up in a fireball. An enraged Loeb, with his weapon still overheated, jumps his Wasp into the flight path of the final LAM, again destroying both machines.
Frost gets back into his Crusader and emerges from the research station to find his lancemates dead. As he views the carnage, an armored 'Mech-sized form emerges from a silo behind him and introduces itself by hurling a boulder - demonstrating its hostile intentions. Frost blasts the charging figure with both lasers and machine guns without apparent affect. The armored figure pounds the Crusader with bruising punches and lashes from its armored tail, knocking the battered Lyran 'Mech prone under the surface of a river. However, Frost tricks it by remaining immobile, and the armored figure loses interest.
As the Crusader surfaces, unfortunately for Frost, the armored figure strikes it with the tip of its tail and delivers a massive electrical shock, frying several of the Crusader's systems and briefly rendering Frost unconscious. Before he loses consciousness, he sees the figure's cockpit unfurl into a mass of armored tentacles and a circular, tooth-filled mouth - demonstrating that there isn't a pilot in the experimental 'Mech. When Frost awakens, the armored figure continues to pound the Crusader. He rights himself and flees back to the compound, with the experimental 'Mech in hot pursuit. It corners him in front of the outpost's power generators, and stabs at the Crusader with its tail.
Frost dodges, and the tail discharges into the generators, creating feedback that overloads the primitive, unstable power plant. While the 'Mech screams, Frost escapes from the facility and just barely manages to survive - being knocked senseless by the blast wave. When he awakens, he files his log, reporting his theory that House Kurita created a purely robotic 'Mech with an artificial intelligence, and worries that if the Combine had created an AI with free will, it could have been the beginning of the end for humanity.
He finishes his report by noting he plans to sell his Crusader when he gets back to Devin and hopes to take early retirement.
Notes: It seems like overkill to use a Union to deliver a recon lance, though that's the closest design, visually, to what we see in this chapter. It's possible the LCS Sphinx is the similar-looking but smaller Confederate-class vessel, which would be more appropriate for Lance-sized deployments. The WarShip isn't an exact match for any existing design, but its sharp prow recalls the Kigamure Pursuit Cruiser, which is described as a "distinct" feature of the class, so this may be a Kigamure that was decommissioned by the SLDF and purchased by the LCAF during the Star League era.
The garrison could consist of elements of the Proserpina Hussars, assuming the decoration on Yoshikawa's lapel is actually a Proserpina Bar. Field Manual: DCMS notes they are "floating regiments" without any specific duty station, and that they regularly test experimental technology for the DCMS. However, the officers refer to each other as Dai-i and Sho-i, which are ranks for the Draconis Combine Admiralty, rather than the Draconis Combine Mustered Soldiery - meaning the Combine navy is running this research project (perhaps explaining why the garrison consists of LAMs instead of regular 'Mechs). Yoshikawa could have served with the Proserpina Hussars before transferring to the Draconis Combine Admiralty's skunkworks.
The "Mozirje Experiment" could have been, as Frost surmises, an experimental BattleMech with a fully robotic control system. Smart robotic control systems were introduced for Aerospace units in 2600, so it's entirely feasible that the Combine (the Draconis Combine Admiralty, no less) could have been looking into adapting the technology for use in ground-based units. We know such a thing is possible, since the Word of Blake unleashed their Revenant-class drone quad and its sister designs in 3075. The current rules require that robotic units be quads for stability. Perhaps the Combine engineers were able to achieve bipedal stability by adding the taser-tail. With the destruction of the research facility and the general loss of knowledge in the conflagration of the Succession Wars, the Combine advances in robotic 'Mechs were lost and forgotten.
On the other hand, it may not have been an AI at all. Given the presence of talons, a mouth, and a tail on an otherwise humanoid 'Mech, and the lack of any direct-fire weapons, the Mozirje Experiment may have been a Combine attempt to graft cybernetics onto an aggressive species of megafauna that could be bred and trained/conditioned to serve the Dragon. We have game rules for training megafauna to serve as infantry mounts, and we have rules for grafting cybernetic weapon systems and other enhancements onto humans, so there should be no logical reason why you couldn't graft cybernetic weapons onto megafauna (Come to Hunter's Paradise and test yourself against our new MechaGodzilla). The Combine has demonstrated a propensity for this sort of experimentation, such as when a Combine research team on Solaris VII turned a docile aquatic creature called a Vodnik into a horrific tentacled killing machine called a Toorima and lost it in the sewers under Solaris City.
I've done what I can to work up an A Time of War stats for the cybernetic "BioMech" variant:
Name: BioMech
Homeworld: Unknown (probably not Mozirje, since the physical characteristics of such a specimen of megafauna would have been on file for this recently-Lyranworld)
Environment: Unknown. Creature observed in temperate climate. Armor may have had built-in climate control.
Body Shape: Bipedal humanoid with a five-meter (est) tail. Each foot has three talons. Hands may have claws, but were armor-sheathed.
Coloring: Unknown
Measurements:
- Length (head to base of spine): 6 meters
- Height (4 meters when on all fours, 10 meters when standing erect) (eye-level with a Crusader)
- Weight (50 tons, est.)
Cybernetic Enhancements:
Reinforced musculature (myomer? genetic engineering?): Increases strength sufficiently to carry a grafted-on suit of BAR 10 armor plating.
Enhanced speed: Outran a 4/6 Crusader, so moves at least 5/8
Offensive adaptation: Talons
Offensive adaptation: Fangs (the mouth is a circular aperture surrounded by eight large triangular teeth and eight tentacles for drawing prey into the mouth). The tentacles may be cybernetically enhanced.
Armor: The creature has been fitted with a suit of BAR 10 armor that withstood two Medium Laser hits, two Machine Gun hits, and a club attack without breaching. Guesstimate 12 tons of standard BattleMech armor.
Enhanced Prosthetic Tail: The tail appears to contain a BattleMech Taser that discharges upon contact with a target.
Secondary Power Supply: Powers the tail taser.
Statistics:
STR: 140 (cybernetically enhanced to the level needed to have a walk of 5 BattleTech MP)
BOD: 75 (it's 'Mech sized, but not "Monstrous" - just "Very Large" with cybernetic enhancements)
DEX: 10 (able to outfight a Crusader with AniMelee)
RFL: 10 (able to outfight a Crusader with AniMelee and outrun a Crusader)
INT: 5 (fooled by a Crusader playing dead)
WIL: 5 (average default)
EDG: 5 (average default)