A Long Journey

[Daryk]

Oh yeah... and you can even vastly improve it with just a Class B Field Refit.  Drop the HS in the leg, change the 15 engine ones to DHS, replace the AC/5 and PPC with ER PPCs and the ammo bin with a DHS.  The last ton can do a lot of things, from upgrading the Small Laser to Pulse, replacing it outright with a Medium, or just converting it to armor.  No Maintenance Facility needed! :)

[wolfcannon]

wonder if any of the hildco or ironside folks left with their lines?

[Wrangler]

Could be a Royal version of the Banshee.

[lowrolling]

Could be a Royal version of the Banshee.

That would be an XL engine, DHS, ERPPC, and two Gause rifles with the weight savings?

[Daryk]

That would be a factory refit...

[lowrolling]

That would be a factory refit...

Your point is made and I do not see how to make it Royal otherwise

[Daryk]

True... the Field Refit would "only" be an SLDF one... :)

[DOC_Agren]

Nice shopping
horrible not all those lines will make it home to Terra and Comstar

[2ndAcr]

18 August 2788
Terra (Comstar)

 "The raids are fully completed. We pulled the Royal Locust lines from Bergen Industries on New Earth and recovered thousands of tons of SLDF material. From Caph, we pulled two Royal Shadow Hawk lines, two Alacorn lines, one Exterminator line plus thousands of tons of material." Major General Lauren Hayes said

 "I also received a report that the 112th Royal Hussar's raided Carver and removed a Pillager line, a Victor line and one Ironside line. Where is that equipment?" Jerome Blake asked

 "The 112th Royal Hussar did not return from their operation. I can only assume that they went rogue on us after the Caph operation." Major General Hayes replied

 "I should relieve you for this Hayes." Jerome Blake said starting to catch on to what she had done.

 "You could, but you won't. The troops follow me, not you. I gave my word that I would stay behind and help you. But you are deviating a little too far for my comfort levels. Those that are gone are no threat to us, so they stay gone. They are to be left alone and that is final. There are limits to what my word and conscious will tolerate. Today starts a new era, we will protect Terra, but no more adventures. My troops do not leave the Terran system. When the fighting winds down we start demobilizing except for a small command to keep Terra safe. Leave those that left alone Jerome, they wanted no part of this course you started down and I let them go. I am serious, leave them alone." Major General Lauren Hayes said firmly

 Jerome Blake was taken back by the sound of her voice, it was like steel. "Very well, today wipes the slate clean. Protect Terra. Those that have left will survive or fall on their own with no interference from me or Comstar."

 "I will keep Terra safe on that you have my word." Major General Lauren Hayes said

Imbrial III (Federated Suns)

 General Samuel Mitchell looked over the prepared positions that his engineers had worked hard to construct and camouflage, they were good, but he also did not line the twelve kilometers of open ground to the next defensive line. He also did not like the utterly obvious defensive position. For a defensive stand, the planet sucked. Vast plains with scant forest cover, at least around the capitol and largest city, was great for maneuver warfare but without air superiority it totally sucked. He turned as he heard someone come up beside him.

 "How long do you think Davion is going to keep us here?" Colonel Harold Tanaka asked

 "Tell you the truth, I am hooping like hell he sends regular AFFS troops to take over from us. This is no place to fight a defensive fight. Even if we stood strong without air cover we are sitting ducks. Even if we pulled back and went urban warfare on them they could just bomb us from the air or worse orbital fire." General Mitchell replied

 "When the DCMS shows up you still want me to stay down in that damned mine?" Colonel Tanaka asked

 "No changes there. Your my ace in the hole. Hopefully they will think my troops are just militia or AFFS regular conventional forces and think we are easy pickings. But that is going to change the moment I unleash all my artillery on them. Best I can hope for is to cause enough confusion that they charge at full speed to get under my guns and then my tanks can pound them. My Alacorn's are my fist so I have assigned two platoons of Pollux ADA to each Battalion to provide them with as much anti aircraft defense as I can. If they try to flank me or I need to fall back, that is where you come in. From that mine complex your only about 5 minutes away, but out of sight and safe from whatever they might throw at us from the air." General Mitchell said

 "Any word on the rest of the fleet?" Colonel Tanaka asked

 "Left Mackolla a week ago. I told them to not push things and recharge normally. Four Tracker Carrier loaded with 36 fighters each and lots of Alamo's to back up Second Chance. The factories are coming online and starting to manufacture what we need at last." General Mitchell said

 "That could make for a very unpleasant surprise for the DCMS, you going to call them in to hit the invasion force?" Colonel Tanaka asked

 "I don't know, that is not really my specialty. That is my sisters area of expertise. I don't like the idea of having them face real warships, she has said that Second Chance is good, but against a real warship they are outgunned big time. Though this deployment has sure given me an eye opening to our shortcomings." General Mitchell said

 "What shortcomings? Granted I only have two Battlemech Battalions here, we are still a very formidable force." Colonel Tanaka replied

 "Yes we are, in certain aspects. We are thinking like we did in the SLDF, well that is dead. It really hit me when we got here, I cannot count on secure flanks or call for help and have another Division show up. Defensively, my 322nd can put up one hell of a fight, but unlike an Infantry Division we lack the Battlemechs to counter the enemies in open field battle. I have had time to really analyze this over the last few weeks and we are going to have to change with the times. When we get back, after this is all over, we are going to have to reorganize to become more nimble. It takes too much shipping to move a full Division, which we do not have." General Mitchell said

 "You going to disband the 322nd?" Colonel Tanaka asked

 "Not on your life. But I realize that there are two tasks a unit like the 322nd excels in, defensive or heavy assault. Not open ground fighting, not rapid advances, but we can do a slow steady grind forward on an objective. I am confident in our ability to take down most Battlemech units if they try to take us on face to face, but they could outmaneuver us too easily. They can cross ground we cannot, jump obstacles or just wade thru it if it is water. But this is for the future, we have to survive this deployment first." General Mitchell said

[Daryk]

Sounds like he's talking RCTs... ;)

[croaker]

Sounds like he's talking RCTs... ;)

More like BCTs.

RCTs, the SLDF made plenty of use of.

[lowrolling]

Strong update and thanks for sharing.

Well it looks like Gen Hayes may need to forget about sleeping ever again for her own safety. Gen Mitchell has at least some sort of plan to try to survive whatever is coming from the DCMS, but I do not think that the Dracs are going to be coming in small when they do come. And it looks like the 112th will be the MVP of this upcoming battle. Hope those factory lines arrive at Mackolla soon and in good order. The Pillager will be just what the General needs to keep Mackolla and surrounding systems safe and undisturbed.

[lowrolling]

Fix needed, I need to see what happens to Gen Mitchell, Patricia Mitchell, Gen Hayes, and I need to see what happens to that production line for Night Hawks please

[2ndAcr]

6 December 2788
Delphos (Federated Suns)

 "Are you sure you should be here?" Captain Curtis Folks asked

 "I am right where I am needed. Thank you for the concern, you may return to your duties Captain Folks." Commodore Patricia Mitchell said

 Her arrival with the four Tracker Carriers had been met with some shock and concern from the various ships crews. But she did not assume command of the now fully assembled task force, this she left to Rear Admiral Wilhelm "Boomer" Polaski. Having arrived with the first batch of former SLDF and Rim World troops from Terra. Trained as a SLDF Aerospace Pilot, he had 73 kills before assuming command of his own carrier, before it was destroyed during the liberation of Terra. He had been the obvious selection to command the four Tracker Carriers and every other jump on the way here he had deviated to uninhabited systems so that the various air wings could complete their work ups and practice anti shipping attacks and the defense of the fleet to counter those shipping attacks.

 She had taken a shuttle over to SLS Second Chance, Vigilant Corvette, so that she could send a message to her brother on Imbrial III.

7 December 2788
Imbrial III (Federated Suns)

 "Message sir."

 General Samuel Mitchell signed for the message and dismissed the runner. He opened the envelope and extracted the message. He paid no attention to the message header but saw it was from SLS Second Chance.

"Greetings Sammy. You have been gone too long and I missed you so I came out with the new arrivals. I am fine so do not worry about me. When the trouble starts, you call and we will be there to support you. We will shed all sorts of sunlight on the Distasteful Cockroaches that are plaguing the region. I made sure we brought plenty of bug spray.

 Update from home, dad is doing a great job on that side of the house. He is running out of easy purchases but has started talking about expanding Lockheed Galactic into other area's. Not sure what that means exactly, he is still in the planning phase. Steady income coming in now and I think the money is burning a hole in his pocket. We got our goods from the deal Colin cut, should have three Merchants by March from the jump cores. First wave of refugees fleeing the invasion arrived in the region and is straining resources already on most systems."

 He could only shake his head at the message from his sister, she was supposed to be heading on her great treasure hunt.

Flushing (Federated Suns)

  Colonel Milton Wolson, 112th Royal Hussar Regiment, was not in a good mood. They had been forced to move away from the Combine invasion front using uninhabited systems, which put him behind schedule to arrive at Delphos for his link up. He hated to be late and now he had to dicker with Federated Suns officials about why his little fleet was not listed in their database anywhere. The Vincent Corvette sitting several thousand kilometers away preventing them from recharging just added to his foul mood. He took the mic away and said.

 "This is Colonel Wolson, commander of this task force. We are trying to link up with General Mitchell and the 322nd. There are no flight plans because we have been traveling via uninhabited systems but the Combine flushed us off our routing. We are in need of food and water for our journey. I have no problem filing a flight plan if you can provide that. If you contact General Mitchell I am sure he can clear this up."

[lowrolling]

First off, Hooray and thank for the update.
 
I am shocked at Patricia not having begun her long journey. I am pleased to see that she is where she needs to be to protect family and friends though. And just how close in Prince John to having an aneurysm from Mitchell's antics? It appears that the DCMS would be well served to simply avoid the 322nd and continue elsewhere.

Glad to see they have those Merchants coming online now, they are going to be sorely needed in keeping the planets the Mitchells are being made responsible for supplied and viable.

Great update and very glad to see the ride continue.

[Daryk]

I bet Mitchell will be just as surprised as everyone else by what's catching flak at Flushing... ;)

[Wrangler]

Huzza! Been waiting for new chapter a while!

[2ndAcr]

12 December 2788
Mackolla (Federated Suns)

 Gerald Mitchell was hard at work finalizing the year for all the various divisions, plus he needed to get a very good view of what sort of income stream he could count on next year, he had serious plans that were going to cost serious amounts of money to get them operational. Lucky for him, it was just a matter of digging thru the computerized files delivered via HPG and then putting it all on paper for his records. He was being a little more detailed in what was being produced so that maybe he could spot area's where changes were needed.

 Mackolla Enterprises Income and Expense 2788

 Jan 2788
 Start Balance 1,493,000,000 (includes 2787 transfer from TechniCorp)

 TechniCorp (Panpour)
 
 Item               Quantity              Revenue            P Margin      Total Profit            P Transfer

 Manticore Tank     81,760      196,224,000,000      13%        25,509,120,000    20,407,296,000
 Goblin Med Tank   52,480       28,864,000,000       12%          3,463,680,000     2,597,760,000  Royalty Payment 259,776,000
 Hvy APC Track      35,000         4,200,000,000       16%            672,000,000         504,000,000 
 Hvy APC Wheel     35,000         3,850,000,000       18%            693,000,000         519,750,000
 Hvy APC Hover     35,000         5,950,000,000        13%           773,500,000         580,125,000

 Mackolla Special Metals (Profits to Expansion) (Mackolla)

 Standard Armor     18,000          180,000,000
 FF Armor                 9,600          192,000,000
 FA Armor               12,000          360,000,000
 Improved FA            4,800          192,000,000
 FC Armor                 1,200            60,000,000
 Gauss Ammo        280,320        5,606,400,000       45%         2,522,880,000

 Froy Industries (Profits to Expansion/Upgrade) (Mackolla)

 Standard HS          36,000            72,000,000      24%            17,280,000
 DH Sink                 24,000           144,000,000      22%            31,680,000
 M7 Gauss Rifle            360           
 Ail Arrow IV                180
 Blanken 25                 288
 Holly Mk II                 216
 Defiance P5M             504
 Defiance P5S             240
 Thumper Art                48
 Blanken LPL               144
 Large Laser                120
 Med Laser                  120
 Small Laser                120
 LRM Ammo                81,000         2,430,000,000       21%           510,300,000
 LRM Swarm Ammo     24,000         1,440,000,000       21%           302,400,000
 LRM Thunder Ammo   12,000            720,000,000       21%           151,200,000
 LRM Art IV Ammo       36,000         2,160,000,000       21%           453,600,000
 LRM Smoke Ammo     12,000             180,000,000       21%            37,800,000
 SRM Ammo                81,000         2,187,000,000       20%           537,400,000
 Streak SRM2 Ammo    21,600         1,166,400,000       41%           478,224,000
 Thumper HE               24,200            108,900,000       26%            28,314,000
 Thumper Illum             8,600              37,700,000       21%             8,127,000
 Thumper Smoke          8,600              37,700,000       21%             8,127,000
 Thumper Cluster          8,600              37,700,000       21%             8,127,000
 Thumper Cop Head      8,600            129,000,000       22%            28,380,000
 Thumper FASCAM      17,200            116,100,000       24%            27,864,000
 Grenade (Hand)         66,000               1,056,000       31%               327,360

 Marley Munitions (Profits to Expansion/Upgrade) (Sparrevohn)

 AC/2 Ammo          45,600            45,000,000        12%            5,400,000     
 AC/5 Ammo          45,600           202,500,000        13%           26,325,000
 AC/10 Ammo         45,600           273,600,000        12%           32,832,000
 AC/20 Ammo         45,600           456,000,000        11%           50,160,000
 LRM Ammo           73,000         2,190,000,000        16%          350,400,000
 SRM Ammo           73,000         1,971,000,000        16%          315,360,000

 Yeffters Weapons (Profits to Expansion/Upgrade) (Gulkana)

 Mydron D AC/2      39,522         2,964,150,000        12%            335,698,000       
 Mydron C AC/5      39,522         4,940,250,000        12%            592,830,000       592,830,000
 Mydron B AC/10     39,522         7,904,400,000        12%            948,528,000       948,528,000
 Mydron A AC/20     39,522        11,856,600,000        12%          1,422,792,000     1,422,792,000
 Mydron MG          52,624           263,120,000        16%             42,099,200
 LRM-5              22,100           663,000,000        19%            125,970,000
 LRM-10             22,100         2,210,000,000        19%            419,900,000       419,900,000
 LRM-15             22,100         3,867,500,000        19%            734,825,000       734,825,000
 LRM-20             22,100         5,525,000,000        19%          1,049,750,000     1,049,750,000
 SRM-2              22,100           210,000,000        19%             39,900,000
 SRM-4              22,100         1,326,000,000        19%            251,940,000
 SRM-6              22,100         1,768,000,000        19%            335,920,000

 Exostar Laser Tech (Profits to Expansion/Upgrade) (Devalan)

 Exostar ER LL      36,000       7,200,000,000        21%          1,512,000,000     1,512,000,000 
 Exostar LL         48,000         4,800,000,000        21%          1,008,000,000     1,008,000,000
 Martell ML         48,000         1,920,000,000        21%            403,200,000
 Martell MPL        24,000        1,440,000,000        21%            302,400,000
 Exostar SL         12,000           135,000,000        21%             28,350,000

 Newhart Battlemech Factory (Mackolla)

 Spider SDR-5Vb        144           720,000,000        16%            115,200,000
 Hussar HSR-200-Db     144        792,000,000        16%            126,720,000
 Guillotine GLT-3N     144            864,000,000        11%             95,040,000
 Crab CRB-27           240            960,000,000        16%            153,600,000  Royalty Payment  15,360,000
 Crab CRB-27b          240         1,072,800,000        11%            118,008,000  Royalty Payment  11,800,800

 Newhart Aerospace Factory (Mackolla)

 Trident TRN-3Tb2      288           691,200,000        14%             96,768,000
 Samurai SL-25         120            288,000,000        14%             40,320,000  Royalty Payment   4,000,000
 Samurai SL-26         120            720,000,000        14%           100,800,000  Royalty Payment  10,000,000
 Hellcat HCT-213N      108           367,200,000        14%             51,408,000  Royalty Payment   5,000,000
 Ironside IRN-SD1X      18            64,800,000          5%               3,240,000  Royalty Payment     320,400
 Hammerhead HMR-HE      18        82,800,000         5%               4,140,000  Royalty Payment     414,000

 Blow/Hookson Technologies (Mackolla)

 Zero ZRO-116b - Three Lines - Monthly Production 54 Total
 Ironside IRN-SD1X - Two Lines planned - Estimated Production 20 Total
 Hammerhead HMR-HE - Two Lines planned - Estimated Production 12 Total

 Blow/Hookson Technologies (Profit to Expansion) (Mackolla)

 Zero ZRO-116b          324         1,101,600,000        17%            187,272,000
 Ironside IRN-SD1X (Jan 2789)
 Hammerhead HMR-HE (Mar 2789)

 Buhallin Military Products (Profit to Expansion) (Mackolla)

 Turhan APC             450           585,000,000        12%              70,200,000
 Goblin (SLDF)          300           450,000,000        12%              54,000,000  Royalty Payment  5,400,000
 PF Barr 14             600            36,000,000         9%               3,240,000
 PF Barr 28           1,400            98,000,000         9%               8,820,000
 PF Admin               300             6,000,000         9%                 540,000
 PF Din Fac 120         800            64,000,000         9%               5,760,000
 PF Din Fac 360         600            60,000,000         9%               5,400,000
 PF Mech 4              200            30,000,000         9%               2,700,000
 PF Mech 12             300           135,000,000         9%              12,150,000
 PF Aero 6              400            80,000,000         9%               7,200,000
 PF Veh 12              400           120,000,000         9%              10,800,000
 PF Ware Small          400            32,000,000         9%               2,880,000
 PF Ware Med            500            50,000,000         9%               4,500,000 
 PF Ware Large          300            45,000,000         9%               4,050,000
 SLDF Reg Mech          800            12,000,000         8%                 960,000   
 SLDF Reg Aero          600             9,000,000         8%                 720,000
 SLDF Reg Armor      12,000            12,000,000         8%                 960,000
 SLDF Reg Inf         3,000            15,000,000        12%               1,800,000
 SLDF Reg Tech        5,000             5,000,000        15%                 750,000
 SLDF Enlist Navy     2,000            10,000,000        12%               1,200,000
 SLDF Eng Navy        1,500            22,500,000         8%               1,800,000
 SLDF Reg Neu Mech      200            20,000,000         5%               1,000,000
 SLDF Reg Neu Aero      300            30,000,000         5%               1,500,000
 SLDF Reg Neu Arm       600            30,000,000         8%               2,400,000
 SLDF Reg Inf Hem     1,200            30,000,000        10%               3,000,000

 Ulston Armor (Profit to Expansion) (Mackolla)

 Thor Art Tank          600         1,200,000,000        17%             204,000,000
 Rotunda                400           176,146,800        24%              42,275,232
 Thumper Artillery    1,000           187,500,000        28%              52,500,000

 Lockheed Galactic (Profit to Expansion) (Mackolla)

 Davion II Destroyer (Repair)          245,000,000       64%             156,800,000
 Davion II Destroyer (Repair)          308,750,000       61%             188,337,500
 Congress D Frigate  (Repair)          675,000,000       62%             418,500,000

 Total Revenue of Mackolla Enterprises - 341,063,972,800
 Total Profit of Mackolla Enterprises - 48,961,169,092
 Total Royalty Payments - 312,071,200
 Total Profit Transfer to Mackolla Enterprises - 32,609,627,200

 Once he was finished, he reached over picked up the sealed envelope from his little army of accountants, opened it up and extracted the several pages inside. He compared his own numbers to those the accountants had put together and smiled, he was only off by several hundred million. The amount of money flowing in and out was astounding and he felt that he should be able to understand the vast numbers at work. Luckily each entity had it's own accountants and handled all the payroll and thousands of other items they needed to handle. His immediate staff only comprised of 83 people and he had a dedicated accountant to handle their payroll. The amazing thing was that not everything was even at full tilt and 2789 was shaping up to be one hell of a year as everything reached full production.

 TechniCorp was the largest employer on Panpour with 220,000 employees. Mackolla Enterprises here on Mackolla, including all the subsidiaries, was also the largest employer with over 165,000 direct employees and another 215,000 employed by subcontractors making various things, from the cloth for uniforms to everything else and yet they still needed even more skilled workers. Lockheed Galactic had finished the second repair slip around October and were just starting two more repair slips to handle the never ending arrival of damaged AFFS ships. There seemed to be an unending supply of skilled ship builders applying for jobs as shipyard complexes were destroyed inside the former Terran Hegemony.
 
           

[lowrolling]

Great continuation and thanks for posting.

It looks like Prince John will not be able to company store them at any point in the near future, but it does bring about the question of how he is going to limit their force expansion when he can. And don't even go into those Marshalls that will want to hamstring Mitchell out of petty vengeance. Those are good numbers coming out of Mackolla and here is hoping that they catch that fissure soon.

[Daryk]

The Federated Suns are going to be in a MUCH better position for the 1SW than canon at that rate! :)

[Wrangler]

I'm so happy see this one updated.  I'm sucker for this style story.  How was the numbers for the corporations calculated?  MekMekHQ won't do that would it?

[shadowdancer]

Love the story line. Please continue writing!

[worktroll]

The Federated Suns are going to be in a MUCH better position for the 1SW than canon at that rate! :)

Pride, and hubris, goeth before a fall. Remember, this isn't titled "A golden age for the FedSuns"; how many have forgotten the whiffs of sulphur? If I may misquote the classics, I reckon "It's a traps!"

[Wolf72]

I'm looking [forward to] at those "missing planets/systems" as a fallback.  I'm a sucker for hidden survivors/empires.