The history of the Seeker Class DropShip, the "Event Horizon" is a long and ill omened one, stretching back almost two hundred years.
In that time, the ship has served in units both prestigious and obscure. It has participated in missions both glorious and mundane. It has traveled to every nation of the Inner Sphere and the majority of the important Periphery realms.
Unfortunately, almost from its very construction on Tharkad, the ship has labored under a reputation as a ship with a dark side.
During the ship's acceptance trials, a catastrophic reactor failure caused by construction mistakes killed the entire trial crew and engineering teams. It took almost a year after this to decontaminate the ship.
The next twenty five years did nothing to help dispel the building reputation of the ship, as an average of three crew-members died each year in improbable accidents and strange circumstances. Airlocks cycled with no command. Pipes ruptured for no apparent reason. Cargo shifted unpredictably, despite being well secured. One Captain was even electrocuted when his command chair somehow became part of the jump circuit controls.
Following this last incident, the surviving crew quietly brought in several priests to perform an exorcism and blessing of the ship. While not sanctioned by higher command, this action appeared to quiet things for the next fifty years.
Unfortunately, this period of quiet was not to last. The next incident was the one to precipitate the ship's departure from Steiner service. Tasked to deliver an independent raiding unit deep behind Marik lines, it is not known what occurred on board, though a mis-jump is suspected. What IS known is that the "Event Horizon" was discovered by Marik AeroSpace patrols drifting powerless with its JumpShip near a pirate point in the system of Campbelton.
Investigation found the two ships to be completely unoccupied with no sign of the crews, or any indication as to their location. (Darker rumors speak of mysterious writings on the bulkheads in corrupt Latin and bastardized Aramaic.) All cargo and equipment, down to the crew and passenger's personal items remained exactly in place, as if they had just set them down and walked away.
In-depth investigation of the Jumpship proved impossible, as during recovery operations, the ship mysteriously regained power and initiated a jump sequence. The "Event Horizon" had already been detached at this point, but the JumpShip, (The Scout class: LCSS Marie Celeste), disappeared and has not been seen again to this day.
The "Event Horizon" passed into mercenary hands at this point, as the ships reputation led many House units to refuse the ship due to morale considerations.
In the last one hundred and thirty five years, the "Event Horizon" has served with ten different mercenary and commercial concerns, each time changing hands under unusual circumstances, and always dogged with rumors of a "Curse" and a reputation as a crew killer.
When news broke of the demise of the majority of the Black Stars at their home base on New Hedon, Herotitus early July 3078, Zhao Zi Long and David Ten-Bears were hard pressed to keep the tattered remnants of the unit together. Putting together small groups of mercenaries, the self appointed CO and XO of the mercenary collective were faced with another problem - the complete lack of interest of any DropShip Captain to sign on.
After thorough meet ups, failed attempts at black mails and bribery, the pair were approached by a Captain Nigel Harris. Pleasantly surprised, but with suspicions on the unsolicited approach, the new Black Stars officers were stunned when it was disclosed that Harris was the Captain of none other than the Seeker Class DropShip Event Horizon.
Dismissing the Captain's (repeated) offer of joining up with the Stars, Zhao and Ten-Bears continued their increasing desperate search for another DropShip. The curse of the Event seemed to leech itself onto the fate of the Stars even at that point. Two other DropShips - the ancient Union Class DropShip Simon Says, and a heavily refitted Mule Class DropShip, the Princess Bride, both suffered mishaps. The Captain of Simon Says was ran over by a garbage truck on his way to put his signature on the papers to tie his Union to the Stars, while the Princess Bride was rendered inoperable indefinitely when an unloading accident resulted in an explosion of a cargo of explosive chemicals that gutted the entire hull of the 11,200 ton DropShip.
Faced with the prospect of being stuck on Herotitus even as the start time of their contract on Fujidera closing in, Zhao and Ten-Bears reluctantly accepted Captain Harris's offer.
Thus began the intertwined fate between the Black Stars and the Event Horizon.
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Like the “Event Horizon”, the “Forlorn Hope” was laboring under a less than ideal reputation. But where the Black Star Seeker had the reputation of a crew killer, the Confederate class DropShip had a dark side of a different sort.
Manufactured all the way back in the original Star League, the “Forlorn Hope” had started its long years of service with the 3345th Star League Cuirassiers, carrying a scout lance into harm’s way during the unification war between the League and the Periphery powers.
Assigned to the Taurian theater, the 3345th Cuirassiers acted as pathfinders for the 7th Army group’s campaigns, and were often the first ones to encounter resistance from the fanatical defenders.
After several offensives, the 3345th were pulled out of the front line and reassigned to “Unconventional operations”. At least that’s what the official story was at that time. In reality, the slow pace of the war, and the heavy price being paid had convinced the Star League generals to shift tactics, and embrace methods of a less… honorable sort.
Assassinations, terror raids, attacks on civilian population centers… all these were done by the jaded members of the 3345th. Perhaps they might have balked at such assignments a few years before, but after years living in the brutality of the Taurian Campaign, they wanted a measure of revenge for lost comrades.
Finally though, they went too far, even for the hell that was the Taurian front. A scout lance of the 3345th, carried by the “Forlorn Hope” was caught on film during a terror raid behind the lines.
The attack on a civilian population center might have been glossed over, but clear footage of a pair of Star League 'Mechs roasting small children alive with flamers and inferno missiles produced outrage and condemnation on a scale rarely seen from the usually somnolent Core World populace, and the 3345th was pulled back to Terra ostensibly for “Investigations”. In reality, the unit was broken up and the personnel distributed all around the League in whatever out of the way backwaters the personnel bureau could find to keep them out of the public eye.
The “Forlorn Hope” was then assigned to the 433rd Royal Training Regiment and stayed on Terra until the Amaris coup.
Captured during the takeover, the “Forlorn Hope” spent the war ferrying members of the Amaris Dragoons from battlefield to battlefield. Or, more correctly, carried butchers from one slaughterhouse to another.
Somehow avoiding destruction when the Dragoons were finally brought to bay, the “Forlorn Hope” then passed briefly into Free Worlds League hands in the chaos after Kerensky’s exodus. Briefly, because the Marik unit that acquired it, shortly thereafter went rogue and pirate, carving themselves a vest-pocket kingdom out on the near Periphery for a decade or so before being crushed.
The succession wars period saw the “Hope” change hands almost a dozen times. Bouncing between pirate hands and small time merc units of little better character, the ship gained a reputation as a haven for warriors of only the lowest and most vile sort. On at least three occasions, a bounty was placed on the ship and her crew… and not “Dead or Alive”, the bounties were for dead only.
The last owner had been of the same sort. A small time pirate-Lord named Joachim “Dirty” Sanchez had had the ship for almost a decade when the Taurian Concordat caught up with him on Rockawellan two years before the new Star League decided to occupy the place.
When they’d dug him out of his mini-fortress, the Taurians had also rescued over two hundred badly abused slaves, and recovered the bodies of another three hundred that had been worked and tortured to death for his amusement.
It was perhaps ironic justice that when the Taurians hanged the man, they’d botched the job, leaving him to strangle slowly as he kicked and struggled to breath.
Normally a ship like the “Hope” would have been taken into service with the Taurians, once it had been refitted. But with the dark reputation the ship carried, none of the Taurian units would accept it. Instead, it amused the Concordat to sell the ship back to the Star League, where it originated, taking with it its reputation and any taint of association back to the source.
After repairs and updating, the ship then sat in mothballs until David Ten-Bears acquired it. All the other potential buyers having been scared off by superstition, or perhaps a desire for something a bit… newer. Either way, David didn’t really care. All that mattered was that it belonged to him now.
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The Saguenay’s long history started way back in 2658 when she had been first launched out of a shipyard now long since lost to the sands of time from the countless battles of the Succession Wars. Originally manufactured to the specifications of what today would be considered an obsolete design she had been twice extensively retrofitted, first to an upgraded Union-class in 3067, and then more recently last year by the new Star League’s Department of Mercenary Management who acquired the ship to be used in one of its starter mercenary programs.
Originally built as a twin ship along with the Union-class Skeena the pair of vessels had been laid down and constructed at virtually the same time and had been bought by a subsidiary firm of Irian BattleMechs Unlimited intended for use in shipping orders to clients outside the borders of the Free Worlds League. For many long years both ships worked in tandem or together making delivers of freshly produced factory products to both worlds within the Free Worlds League and outside its borders to planets such as Altair, Dieron, Solaris VII, Sian, Terra, Tikonov and once even as far away as Canopus IV. It was during one of these trips in 2729 that things took a horrible turn for the worse.
A transportation manager for the firm was bribed and later discovered to be implicated in a plot with four other individuals to have a shipment of ‘Mechs and both DropShips stolen while on the final legs of their journey to Canopus IV. However the Free Wolds League military and Irian BattleMech Unlimited were too late in being able to prevent the theft and a large collection of mercenaries overran the Invader-class JumpShip Yougotoy and her three attached DropShips in an uncolonized system just one jump outside the League’s border. Part of the reason for the slow response by the Free Wolds League military was due to the ongoing political crisis and the dissolving and subsequent arrest of the Free Wolds League Parliament one week after the plotted theft was discovered. To this day it is not know who was responsible for the attack, whether there was Cappellan or Taurian influence or even if the Magistracy of Canopus itself was responsible when it later refused to pay for the lost shipment. All that is known is the spotty details of the aftermath.
Several weeks later the mercenaries jumped into the system PT8794, which would in the future be colonized and renamed Rockwellawan, where they released the Mule-class civilian transport Arboris and some of the JumpShip crew to a band of pirates known as “The Shelhaiya” for a modest fee. These survivors were later ransomed back to the Free Wolds League or would be found working as slaves on half a dozen bandit held worlds. The mercenaries however would then make a jump to another uncharted system to meet their contract employers for payment and transfer. However during the subsequent negotiations the mercenary commanders doubled the price of their operating fee and tensions mounted to the point where combat ensued. Most of the mercenary fighters were destroyed in the opening minutes of the engagement, but before a boarding action could be completely achieved the mercenaries attempted to jump out system. By this time however both the Saguenay and Skeena had been seized by boarding teams and both ships had detached from the JumpShip’s docking collars. When a jump window was opened both Union-class DropShips were still inside the KF Drive field and were violently hurtled through space with the Yougotoy even though they were not securely attached. When a malfunction in the KF Drive caused a partial field collapse at 99.4% of the jumps distance and then again at 99.99937% the Yougotoy arrived in the Herotitus system approximately 10AU out from the systems star, however both DropShips were missing.
It took another two weeks for the JumpShip to recharge and make the jump to Ward were those on board issued a distress signal to the colony in system. When a relief ship arrived with supplies most of the persons on board had succumbed to starvation. Those that survived would give little information as to the incidents that transpired. It took almost another 300 years for the story to pick up again when in 3013 a single ship was tracked drifting into the Herotitus system by a band of mercenaries known as “The Roadrunners” who salvaged it and discovered it to be the lost Saguenay. For the next fifteen year the Saguenay served mainly along the FWL with the Roadrunners conducting operations during the 3014 Free Wolds League civil war, a few raids into MoC space and fighting off piracy. The Roadrunners were destroyed during the fighting that followed the Duchy of Andurien seceding from the Free Wolds League, supporting the fledgling nation in their attack on the Capellan Confederation the ship was captured, than upgraded and later sold on Palos to the Styk’s Commonality. As part of the Styk’s limited navy force the ship succeeded in helping stall the invasion of Gan Singh during Sun-Tzu Liao’s Xin Sheng movement. The ship’s crew was credited with killing three medium class Capellan aerospace fighters in the opening engagements alone, but after grounding on planet was placed back in Capellan hands when the Commonality fell. Afterwards she was transferred to the SLDF navy while Sun-Tzu Liao was the first Star Lord of the Second Star League.
Initial used for running supplies in and around the Chaos March when Terra was recaptured by ComStar for the first time in over 350 years the Saguenay began running shipments from Irian BattleMechs Unlimited to Terra again, but this time working for the SLDF navy. However the ship itself, it has been logged, stubbornly refused to cooperate. The engines would cut out, controls surfaces would suddenly freeze and at one point the ship shut down all air traffic in a 300km radius around the Irian BattleMechs Unlimited factories small spaceport when the ship was blamed for transmitting a screeching signal on all available communications frequencies that totally disabled all communications for close to an hour with no known scientific or mechanical cause.
Yet there is one explanation that has been put forth by her last Captain, a man named Neil Silver, who reported in the ships log, that the ship itself is cursed! Rather if one took the time to look back through the ships record, wrote the Chief Engineer Kenneth MacDonald in a memo during the ships recent refit to a DMM Edition status at the Alice Springs Spaceport on Terra, the vessel isn’t so much cursed as it is obsessed.
Starting with the most recent ‘anomaly’ and working back operators at the air traffic control center for the Irian BattleMech Unlimited spaceport were quoted as saying when the ship let out its burst of static that a bone chilling female voice could be heard calling out “Skeena! Skeeeeeena!” amid the static and background noise of whatever failed mechanics caused the event in the first place. Computers would shut down whenever anyone tried to erase or move out old ships records to another mainframe to save memory space in the vessels computer core. The engines would fail whenever the ship finally arrived at its destination star system, along its old convoy route as if it were waiting for another vessel to hurry up and follow along. A JumpShip Captain once made the mistake of renouncing the ship's past and the existence of the Skeena by extension as a load of bologna. The Saguenay’s engines cut it to early during the undocking procedure and the JumpShip’s number 4 collar was all but destroyed when the engines melted away and scorched most of the frame in that area.
At Gan Singh when the Capellan navy sent six fighter craft to intercept and destroy the Saguenay and her two aerospace escorts the only surviving Capellan Confederation pilot talked of their fighter’s sensors playing tricks as if there were two DropShips flying side by side. The pilot, one Mallory Qin Li gave a report of an enemy ship that seemed to be possessed by a demon. Not only did sensor ghosts prevent the Capellan forces from achieving solid locks on their much larger target but the Ship itself seemed to seethe with fury. Miss Li announced that its armor absorbed damage as if it were twice as thick as it should be, and that the craft's energy weapons in particular fired with an accuracy and with such devastation as to be labeled paranormal. However the trouble the Capellan navy had with the ship didn’t start there. Years earlier when the Capellan’s had captured the Saguenay and begun retrofitting her for an upgrade the vessel mysteriously broke free of the stations moorings and lazily spun off using maneuvering thrusters in the direction of Herotitus. But even before that strange episode the craft claimed the life of a Captain and his aide who had ordered the vessels name to be change to “Huo Niao” (Fire Bird). The Captain, his aid, and their Rotunda armored car were vaporized on the spaceport tarmac at Grand Base when a lower weapons pylon puzzlingly opened fire without the vessels primary fusion drive being online.
During the extensive time the Saguenay had been in the employ of the Roadrunner mercenary unit the CO Captain Jake Gallegar had spent quite an effort at searching for the lost Skeena in and around Herotitus during his near yearly trips to the mercenary world. This seemed to have placated the Saguenay for during her entire history with the Roadrunner’s she served them admirably without complaint. For now however historians to this day say the fate of the Skeena remains an ever present mystery, and the Saguenay seemingly a ghostly shell of her former self, wandering and meandering through the stars watching and waiting for the return of her lost sister.
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"Many of the Tamar and Skye worlds in the Lyran Alliance were populated by the Scottish and Irish, and many of us, including me, have some heritage from that direction, though I am mostly of German origin. Nonetheless, I speak fluent Gaelic, and as part of our schooling we are taught the histories.
“One of the most celebrated of the Scots was a poet named Robert Burns, and his famous work is a cautionary tale told in verse, about a man named Tam o’Shanter. Now Tam was an honest man, but prone to giving himself over to the drink. His wife, portrayed as an authority to be feared, usually keeps him in line either through her viscous tongue or with the threat of a frying pan to the back of the head.
“One evening however, after a trip to the markets, Tam gives over to his desire for the drink and settles in at the local pub to down some ale. When he finally realizes his predicament, that he is drunk, it is late and his wife will give him a thrashing when he gets home it is already nearly midnight, or the witching hour back in those days if you will.
“On his way home, Tam, through a drunken haze, perceives a strange ritual in the local church which is commonly believed to be haunted. A group of witches and warlocks are performing a wild dance, complete with open coffins and the devil himself in tow. The witches are dressed only in the their night-shirts, and the prettiest of the witches, named Nannie, has on a shirt, called a cutty-sark in those days, that is much too small and reveals more of the comely witch than Tam’s inebriated libido can resist, so he calls out:
“’ Weel done, Cutty-sark! And in an instant all was dark’”
“Well, even a drunkard like Tam could now see he was in serious trouble as the assorted ‘Hellish Legion’ started to chase after him. Putting all his faith in his horse Meg, Tam o’Shanter fled for the bridge across the River Doon, as all good folk knew in those days that the wielders of magic could not cross running water.
“The mare wins the race, though not before losing her tale to Nannie, who is not only the most comely but the fastest and hungriest of the assembled demonic host. Tam, it is assumed, goes home to face the wrath of his wife, but the tale concludes with a warning to all, albeit with tongue firmly in cheek:
“’ Now, wha this tale o' truth shall read,
Ilk man and mother's son, take heed:
Whene'er to Drink you are inclin'd,
Or Cutty-sarks run in your mind,
Think ye may buy the joys o'er dear;
Remember Tam o' Shanter's mare’”
“Nice story,” Cherie complemented after a moments silence, “So you have called our Aurora DropShip Tam o’Shanter then?”
“Actually I was going to name it Meg after the horse,” Markus replied.
“That is a stupid name for the ship,” Michelle exclaimed, giving Markus a hard look.
“I know,” he said back with a grin, “So yes, Cherie, the ship will be named the Tam o’Shanter, more due to the fact that he had his fun and got away with it than anything to do with the moral of the story.”
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"The tiles you stand on, the handles on the doors, and all the buttons and switchs on the Charon's Ferry are likewise of bone and human ivory. We surround ourselves with reminders of what awaits all of us in the end, so that we might reflect on its meaning, and never lose sight of our ultimate fate.” Gaius Marius's conversation with Zhao Zi Long, 19 October, 3081.
The legacy of the dead permeates the Aurora DropShip's entire history. Charon's Ferry has seen more death than even the most prolific killers in history. Before the Black Stars Mortuus Legio Victrix sub-unit acquired her, the Ferry was a morgue ship, carrying the remains of countless souls into the heavens, to be set free amongst the stars. Instances when it was employed included when a small nuclear weapon was employed as part of the little succession disagreement in the Free Worlds League a few years ago. This particular Aurora was there, carrying away the remains of the dead so as to prevent the spread of disease and help restore order. It was also part of the response to the Winter Plague outbreak on Mauripur, that time carrying medical supplies to the system, and then housing the physicians as they tried to stop the Plague. It also carried their bodies away again, when the Plague struck them down as well when they got careless.
All in all, this small DropShip carried over a million discarded mortal shells in its short time.
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Seen from outside, the Departed’s Lament looked much like any other DropShips of its class. This DropShip in particular is old, its history dating all the way back to the First Succession War, which was where it received its current name. Originally made and used by the Draconis Combine, the DropShip had been one of the many attached to the Kurita units on Kentares IV on those fateful days, and it had participated in the infamous Kentares massacre. When Davion units captured the DropShip later on that war, they had made use of it for themselves, and baptized it with its current name, which it had kept until now.
For the past several decades the Union Class DropShip had been privately owned by the crew that currently runs it, and if records were true, it had been used not only as a transport, but often also linked to smuggling activities and other black market related deals, which gives the ship and its crew a sort of taint that most more respectable unit prefers to not deal with. Aina of the Black Stars Hell Falcons sub-unit saw no issue in those matters though, and besides, her need is more pressing that she simply cannot afford to be picky in these issues. The DropShip is an old one, that one is clearly visible, despite the recent upgrade to its current specification, and although it shows its age, it also seemed to be well-maintained. The multitude of bunkrooms as opposed to larger, communal barrack-like bunks lend further credence to the ship’s origin as one of the first of its class to see service, as does its roomy mess hall.
