Date: December 15, 3026
Location: Albiero
Title: MechWarrior - Matabushi Ambush
Author: Peter Fokos
Type: Encounter
Synopsis: Following Gideon's meeting with Tasha after the bar fight with the Black Widow, Gideon is faced with two individuals - Kearny and Tasha - both claiming to be Federated Suns intelligence agents (MIIO and DMI's MI6 respectively), giving him conflicting information about the motivation behind the attack on Anders Moon and who to trust.
This trend continues - some time after the bar fight, Gideon gets a message from his trusted family friend, who gave him a Jenner and set him on the path to seek the Chalice of Herne and his family's murderers, Jordan Rowe. Rowe confirms that the Kurita military is behind Jarris McBrin's power grab, and that the DCMS wants a strategic outpost from which to respond to Operation GALAHAD '27. He recommends contacting MIIO agent Kearny on Albiero for more information.
However, Tasha sends Gideon purported transcripts of intercepted communiques between Matabushi CEO Duke Ishi Tahiro, Trade Division CEO Marquis Tanji Koetsu, and Special Operations Director Hohiro Anato regarding Operation INROAD. The communications suggest that the small world would be of little interest to the DCMS, and thereby would provide a prime venue for smuggling, if the local government could be co-opted. When Duke Vandenburg (Gideon's father) refused to cooperate, Matabushi authorized the Dark Wing to eliminate him, having bribed both McBrin and Rowe to cooperate in the regime change.
With damning but contradictory evidence in hand, Gideon travels to Albiero in an attempt to make contact with Kearny, and follows a map to a landing site that was signed "a friend." Unsure of what to expect, Gideon sees seven Karnov VTOLs arrive in a desert canyon and the Kurita troops aboard begin to offload valuables from a massive vault built into the canyon wall.
Ambushers rise up around the convoy and attack, boarding some of the VTOLs and shooting one down as it attempts to take off. Gideon spots Tasha in the middle of the fight, running to board the lead VTOL. Gideon runs to join her, and catches hold just as it takes off.
Inside, Gideon finds Kearny holding Tasha at gunpoint as she pilots the Karnov. Tasha banks sharply and evades Kearny's aim. The two face off and notice Gideon for the first time. Both claim the other is an ISF agent and ask Gideon to help.
Gideon takes Tasha's side and she knocks out Kearny. Resuming control of the Karnov, Tasha explains that MI6 got word Matabushi was transferring gold bullion, cash for laundering, LosTech, and computer files. She says that the files contain the location of the Dark Wing and the Chalice of Herne. She gives it to Gideon with the expectation that he will be able to expose and disrupt Matabushi's operations on Anders Moon. She cautions Gideon to maintain secrecy, noting that MI6 does not officially exist.
Gideon later reviews the computer data, which confirms Tasha's story about Operation INROAD - to set up a cover operation in the Federated Suns for money laundering and smuggling, using Grig Griez's JumpShip and a special lance of 'Mechs, plus bribes for agents on Anders Moon, including Jordan Rowe.
Notes: This is the penultimate "scene" in the MechWarrior game, where all the subterfuge is laid bare and the scene is set for the final showdown in glorious VGA color.
The setup is left vague for dramatic purposes, since (like all the "Encounter" portions) the player has a choice to make, where the wrong option leads to death, and it's unclear who "a friend" is. While that works from a dramatic gameplay point of view, it seems unconscionably sloppy for Tasha to bring Gideon into a live fire shooting gallery without letting him know who was doing the inviting. So was her telling him "By the way, MI6 is top secret, so don't tell anyone," after having introduced herself as MI6 in a crowded Drac bar.
(Likewise, it's hard to reconcile the idea of MI6's existence being a closely held state secret, when there's both an MI5 and MI7 in the DMI TO&E, strongly implying the existence of an MI6 in there somewhere.)
Operation INROAD still confuses me. We know that it involved smuggling across the Davion/Kurita border in partnership with Grig Griez, Jordan Rowe, and a duped Jarris McBrin. The operation would net Matabushi an estimated 600 million C-bills per year, with the puppet government of Ander's Moon providing cover for the Stonebow and other smuggling ships by laundering the smuggling revenue and providing falsified customs checks. On the surface, all well and good.
But the question is, why go to all that trouble? Uninhabited systems are a smuggler's friend, and a distribution deal with someone like Griez in the Federated Suns would have allowed Matabushi to outsource the work of forging bills of lading and laundering the money. Heck, ComStar's neutral - would they even care where H-Bills came from when it was presented for conversion into C-Bills? And why would Tahiro have had to lean on the ISF for permission to go ahead?
I can only speculate that Matabushi was involved in moving some goods that may not have been, strictly speaking, in the Combine's best interests, possibly on behalf of the yakuza. However, in that case, why were DCMS troops and an ISF agent providing security, and why was MI6 so keen to target Matabushi and break up the plan? Was Operation INROAD just phase one as part of a larger plot to establish a base of operations behind the first line of defense in the Draconis March - much like Ricol's plan for Trell I?
The transfer of goods out of the Matabushi vault also seems odd to me. If you have a nice vault like that, why remove the contents, instead of doubling down on security? Where was all that gold, money (for laundering), LosTech, and computer data records going? Another Matabushi facility? The money would theoretically have been bound for Ander's Moon to be laundered. Was the gold to pay bribes? And why move the computer records (an artifact of Peter Fokos writing in an era predating networked computers - future of the '80s) and LosTech?
The LosTech cache is particularly intriguing. LosTech is generally treated as generic "TREASURE!" by BattleTech characters, who splice the best bits into their war rigs and sell the rest. But where does the "rest" go? Are collectors hanging mysterious "Left Handed Framistat XL39s" in their private galleries? Are R&D labs futilely trying to reverse engineer the items? One thing that bothered me is that we never saw any of this LosTech being deployed in the field circa 3025, where it could provide a decided advantage. Theodore Kurita got a Dragon from his father and an Orion from his aunt. Both were stock. One might think that the sole heir of House Kurita would rate an upgraded model. Surely a Great House would have some LosTech squirreled away for personal use, if Matabushi has a private collection. Or were the Kurita troops there because the LosTech belonged to House Kurita, and was being researched by Matabushi?
The revelation that Jordan Rowe was part of the plot against Gideon was fairly surprising, since he gave Gideon the Jenner and sent him off to track down the Dark Wing. Was he trying to keep Gideon in his back pocket in case Matabushi tried to betray him, so he could claim to have been working covertly to aid the rightful heir if word of his support for Matabushi came out? Otherwise, Rowe would have been strongly motivated to simply shoot Gideon back on Ander's Moon.