15 March 3057
Pattonsburg
Harry Mitchell was given a tour of the campus of Mitchell Institute of Space Sciences by Dr Garcia and was amazed at how large the campus had grown. The campus covered over a 2 square kilometers of ground and the dormitory area housed thousands of students. "Dr Garcia, you have worked miracles here. Exactly how many students do we have enrolled right now?" Harry asked
"Thanks Harry, currently enrolled is 31,000 students with the following listings, we just graduated a large class of students:
Jumpship Pilot Course- 1400, 757 in 2nd year (300 graduate June 3058, 457 graduate Jan 3059)
Jumpship Navigator- 800, 525 in 2nd year (200 graduate June 3058, 325 graduate Jan 3059 )
Jumpship Engineer- 1200, 785 in 2nd year (300 graduate June 3058, 485 graduate Jan 3059)
Space Crewmen- 4200, 1991 in 2nd year (891 graduate June 3057, 1100 graduate Jan 3058)
Dropship Pilot- 1150, 675 in 2nd year (300 graduate June 3057, 375 graduate Jan 3058)
Dropship Engineers- 1100, 720 in 2nd year (300 graduate June 3057, 420 graduate Jan 3058)
Ship Construction- 6800, 1975 in 2nd year ( 850 graduate June 3057, 1125 graduate Jan 3058)
Factory Worker- 6200, 2900 in 2nd year (1100 graduate June 3057, 1800 graduate in Jan 3058)
Salvage Course- 1380, 750 in 2nd year (350 graduate June 3057, 400 graduate Jan 3058)
Aerospace Tech- 2275, 980 in 2nd year (400 graduate June 3057, 580 graduate Jan 3058)
Loader Mech- 680 (680 graduate Jan 3057)
Space Port Worker- 3800 (3800 graduate Jan 3058)
As you know we just graduated a large class and the new hire all went to Demeter on your orders, but as you can see, in a few month I will have another graduating class even larger than that one. I think we are hitting the upper limit on how many we can teach though. Our current yearly tuition stands at 1,065,000,000 C-Bills. Our operating budget is currently at 575 million C-Bills. We have a faculty staff of 1,300 instructors. Total employed by the school are 3700. We make a profit, that is for sure." Dr. Garcia said
"Damn, this thing just took off. Outstanding work Dr. Garcia, outstanding. Some of the pressure is off us at Mackolla, I gather a bunch of folk came over from Bamburgh and have been doing hands on training there and for once all of our manufacturing is fully staffed. Next graduating class of new hires also goes to Demeter. I am going to put some yards in place there for actual construction. Salvatore is going to produce 2 yards for me and Mitchell Interstellar will transport them to Demeter. We will then expand our operation at Demeter using those yards. Not sure if I will put warship construction in place there, but we will churn out some standard Jumpships and do some serious maintenance and refit work there. Now that I have authorized the FedCom's to release our tech wholesale across the Commonwealth, I am not sure what will happen." Harry said
"Well, for one thing, all those shipyards and such is going to put a strain on our recruiting some. Every manufacturer will be clamoring for the graduates here." Dr. Garcia said
"That they will. One thing we have going for us, is salvage operations. We are still the king of that area. When I get back, I am going to make sure we are set on that front. Sooner or later a bigger dust up is going to occur and I am going to make sure Mitchell Salvage is prepared for it. No one really hires salvage techs but us. I still have months of travel to work out the kinks and such." Harry said
"So, what else has happened down at Mackolla Harry?" Dr. Garcia asked
"We have grown by leaps and bound Doc. We can build just about everything down there now. Heck, we even hand build Clan Omni-Mechs, but I just got word back that we will now be in the Mech production business for real. With a real assembly plant. We got real ex-Clan scientists back home now and they work magic. We make our own Battle Armor of sorts, a light suit. I bought 300 suits of the standard BA from Albion Advanced Technologies and Products, and I will let them pull a few apart and we should be able to make them down there. I also got word that we are soon to be in the tank production business too. Hell, it is getting hard to keep track of what all we build and don't build." Harry said
"Well Harry, you have said it before, it has been one hell of a ride the last ten years or so. Let's go grab some dinner and you can bring me up to speed for real on all the excitement and stuff." Dr. Garcia said
Mackolla
Scott had received word from Harry about Comstar accepting the trade and all the details of the trade. Well, that is good, the Aegis Cruiser was only a week away from Mackolla. I can send them both back at the same time. Scott thought to himself. So we get a for real mech production plant, Craig will love that, but I think we need to send that to Bamburgh. We have way more people over there. We have the tank plant being built in one area, we put the mech plant in another area.
Scott was still awaiting word from the AFFC on new personnel.
New Avalon
The request for personnel for the MDF was met with some confusion. It took Quintus Allard a trip to New Avalon after being summoned for consultations to sort it out. It was then realized that local recruitment for the new 6th Davion Guards RCT must have hit the MDF garrison harder than expected. But it did not take long to sort out. Luckily, the Department of the Army and Navy had continued updating MIIO on AFFC personnel leaving service, since no one cancelled the order to do so. Messages were sent out and responses came back in. Within a week they had culled the responses focusing on planets 5 jumps from New Avalon to link up with the circuit to Crofton.
Mechwarriors- 286
Aerospace Pilots- 185
Mech Techs- 186
Aerospace Techs- 152
Space Crew- 1174
Scott had not requested any infantry or armor crew personnel, so those were left out. It was decided to send the requested personnel with new AFFC crews being sent to Mackolla. The AFFC had enough crews ready for possibly 9 ships so they would be sending 2700 crew personnel to Mackolla anyway for hands on training. It was then decided to make sure those crews had something to pilot so a order was made ready for Mitchell Aerospace for construction. 2 days of consultations with the Navy and things were in order and the fax sent to Mackolla.
To: Leftenant General Scott Mitchell, commander Mackolla Defense Force
From: Quintus Allard
Sorry about the delay my boy. Seems they did not realize that you got raped in the recruitment process for the 6th. Following personnel will be at Crofton July 3057 for transfer along with AFFC crews.
Mechwarriors- 286
Aerospace Pilots- 185
Mech Techs- 186
Aerospace Techs- 152
Space Crew- 1174
Also, resume production of remaining previous contract. We have the staffing getting sorted out now. Remaining contract is:
2 Invader Q-ships
4 Buford Corvettes
18 Patrol Corvettes
Come visit me soon Scott.
Q
24 March 3057
Mackolla
Scott received the fax from New Avalon and smiled on reading it. Good old Quintus, I miss the guy. Scott made a call to the Shipyards. Boss answered "Yeah Scott, what can I do for you?"
"Resume construction on the remaining ships for the AFFC contract soon as you can. You remember the count right?" Scott ordered
"Of course I remember the count. I can even tell you when I will have the entire order completed. I do keep a running list of what needs to be done. I will have the Patrol Corvettes completed 1 July 3057, all 18 of them,4 Buford Corvettes completed 1 June 3057 and the last 2 Q-ships done 1 May 3057. This is not my first rodeo, plus I have all of my stuff fully staffed for once. I can churn these out in no time at all. Now George will complain that I am using too much material when just a week ago he was bitching about me not using enough material." Boss replied.
Scott was a little amazed "The entire order? In less than 6 months time?"
"Yes, Hell, I only have the Victory Cruisers in construction. And we already completed maintenance on everything in system. The Aegis arrives in 2 days, so I have some maintenance to do on those ships, but I have 12 ship yards idle right now. The Buford and Q-ship will be in the 500k yards and I will use all 6 250k yards to do the Patrols. Easy." Boss said
"What about the cores, I expected those to slow us down?" Scott asked
"I have all the jump cores already built and in transport containers for safe keeping. I never stopped building them." Boss said
"Okay, I will reply to New Avalon with a ETA, be listening for the scream." Scott said
29 March 3057
New Avalon
Field Marshall Steiner burst out laughing when she saw the look on Marshall of the Armies Morgan Hasek Davion's face as he read the fax from Mackolla she had handed him. He could not help but smile in return. "We should have expected it, tell them to proceed and they once again outproduce our ability to man the damn things. Tell the damned navy they better order some way bigger ships next time. Something that takes some time to build for Christ sakes. At least MAS is giving us upgraded ships on the Buford's. LF batteries on them."