Chương 39: Chapter 3
Captain Serena Gomez was a short woman, five-foot-five-inches of Latina who refused to take shit from anyone, dressed in a utility tanktop and fatigue pants. Apparently, they were her usual attire whenever she was aboard the Claremont. She also had the bulky form of a Mydron Auto-pistol slung low on her hip and a combat knife in a boot sheath. I met with her not on the bridge, but in the secondary cargo hold. Where she was busy settling an argument between a cute, brunette, lab-coated, bespectacled, scientist, and a balding, jumpsuited, twitchy, technician. As the technician who I'd gotten to show me the way led me over to the trio, he groaned at the sight and rolled his eyes. I hoped that wasn't a sign that this happened often. I didn't need potential sexual harassment lawsuits cropping up if that's what this was.
Fortunately, as I approached, the group, the nature of the dispute became clear. The Balding Technician didn't like the way the Lab-Coated Brunette was doing things, even though she was his direct superior. It was a pretty standard academic dick-measuring contest, made all the more baffling by the fact that only one of the two actually had the right equipment to fit that description. Captain Gomez was handling it well, though, cutting through the Balding Technician's neuroses like a blade while simultaneously smoothing over the Lab-Coated Brunette's ruffled feather.
"Look, Roderick, Doctor Acker is our Chief Engineer. Whether you like it or not, she outranks you." Intoned Captain Gomez.
"She might outrank me for now, but I doubt the new boss wants a valuable piece of LosTech destroyed because Doctor Acker didn't know the right procedures. I swear, it's like I'm the only one who knows what he's doing sometimes!" Complained the Balding Technician, Roderick.
"That's ridiculous! The Manheim Technique is a time-tested protocol for data-gathering the capabilities of an unknown system!" Exclaimed the Brunette, Doctor Acker.
"That just makes it well known! If you try to interface with the onboard systems using the Manheim Technique, I hope you're ready to explain why the secondary Cargo hold was exposed to vacuum!" Argued Roderick.
"Enough! I swear if I wanted to deal with stubborn Burros, I would have stayed on Cerillos! Roderick, what are you talking about?" Snapped Captain Gomez.
"Look, Captain, Doctor Acker is great at reverse engineering, but she doesn't have the practical experience with field engineering I have, I've seen this sort of thing before in an old SLDF Cache and if you don't want to cause an explosion, you should listen to me. Actually, how I wound up on that particular expedition is kind of a funny story, see I was on Atreus for a Conference on Mechanical Engineering and this guy comes up to me. . ." Began Roderick only for Captain Gomez to cut him off.
"Get to the point, Roderick." She insisted.
"Right, well, the Manheim Technique requires you to plug a Noteputer into the diagnostic port in a cockpit. The cockpit of this prototype ExplorerMech has had its diagnostic booby-trapped. It's a pretty common sabotage technique the SLDF used to use during the Kerensky Coup. See the seam between the rim of the port and the actual port? That isn't just prototype engineering, that's a sensor attached to a security clamp. If you try to plug a non-authorized Noteputer into the diagnostic port, not only will it lock your data jack in place, but it will also start scramming the reactor." Explained Roderick.
"Why didn't you just say that in the first place?" Hissed Doctor Acker
"Well, it's hard to do that when you don't want to listen to me." Frowned Roderick.
"You opened the conversation by telling your technicians it was a stupid order and demanded they not follow it!" Pointed-Out Doctor Acker.
"It was, besides, I was on my way to talk to you immediately after, how was I supposed to know you'd entered the Cargo Bay?" Shrugged Roderick.
"Enough, you two. Roderick, can you disarm the booby trap?" Sighed Captain Gomez.
"Sure, if you give me a day or so to work out the specific trick to this one. These sorts of devices tend to come with a mechanical backdoor in case the SLDF retook the facility they'd abandoned the equipment in. Every base had a different one though, so I just need twenty-four hours to crack it." Shrugged Roderick.
"Good. Gotta say though, I'm not sure it's worth the delay for a Prototype ExplorerMech that just has an Auto-Cannon, Sensor Pod, and Salvage Arm." Sighed Captain Gomez.
"It's worth it, Doctor James says the Sensor Pod has a Guardian ECM Suite hooked into it and that Auto-Cannon has a CASE Ammunition Bunker. Apparently, there were a number of prototype ExplorerMechs built before the final collapse of the Star League that would be used to explore harsh worlds in the Deep Periphery. The Sorts of Places where Second Exodus ships from some of the more eccentric or unlucky colonists could have potentially wound up. Places with high background radiation, frozen iceballs, oceanic worlds, methane atmospheres, and the like. Where the scattered colonists might have been relegated to techno-barbarism in underground or dome cities. This looks like one of those." Informed Doctor Acker.
"Plus, you're probably going to get the same thing going on with the Exploration Vehicles over on the Hoard-Hauler, to say nothing about the stuff in the Drydock that we couldn't grab." Agreed Roderick.
"Fine, it isn't like we don't have the time. Doctor Acker, can your people work on something else? Maybe one of the Water Purifiers or Storm Inhibitors? Kimiko's Team is already pouring over the partial data core we nabbed. I want as much work as we can get done on this haul before we arrive at Iron Land." Queried Captain Gomez.
"Sure. I've already got a technician doing the preliminary work on one of the Storm Inhibitors. I figure I might be able to even knock out a rough outline for a reverse-engineered schematic for Bill's Team back on Iron Land to tweak a bit. I know that was one of the stumbling blocks to the plan to take control of Last Chance and Botany Bay. Both planets are just too prone to blizzards for large-scale habitation these days, and they don't have more than twenty-thousand inhabitants in domes and along the equator." Nodded Doctor Acker.
"Good, now, this little spat has taken up enough of my time. I need to go meet with the new Boss." Grumbled Captain Gomez.
"Speaking of now seems like a good time to interrupt." I nodded.
"Hablando del rey de Roma. Looks like the new boss found me." Chuckled Captain Gomez.
"Sorry, I don't speak Spanish." I admitted.
"It doesn't matter. So, you're here. There's a lot to go over, I'm sure you overheard at least some of that, but we found an old SLDF Garrison and Exploration Research Outpost deeper in the Periphery and picked up a number of goodies. I'll go over the specifics with you shortly, but I refuse to do so on an Empty Stomach, so can we do this in the Officer's Mess?" Asked Captain Gomez.
"By all means, Captain. Lead on." I nodded.
Captain Gomez led me to a small stateroom with well-upholstered furniture and soft lighting from a faux chandelier. Apparently, this place was just for the higher Officers of the Company while aboard the Jumpship, though it doubled as a receiving room for potential high-status guests or VIPs. Supposedly, the Dropship Captains could also use the facility, but most of them preferred to take over a table in the less formal Captain's Lounge, which wasn't as well appointed and didn't have an attached galley but did have a bar, holoplayer, and various other recreational things.
As Captain Gomez sat down, a number of people entered. Doctor Acker came in, likely having been called to meet with the new boss by Captain Gomez, as did a Blonde-Haired Woman in a flight suit with a Group Commander's insignia on it who had a bored look on her face. Next to arrive was a Scarred Man with steel gray hair done up in a buzz cut wearing fatigues and a combat harness. Bringing up the rear was a Bearded Man with long hair and a rather robust physique, let's call it. As they all took their seats, another Portly Man with a ponytail wearing a Chef's jacket arrived and poured us wine, put out bread, butter, and olive oil, and then went into the attached galley to begin to cook up something in a big pot.
"All right, so first off, let me be the first to offer my condolences on the passing of your father. He was a great man and a great boss and he'll be sorely missed." Began Captain Gomez. Murmurs of condolences and nods of agreement rang out from the assembled staff before I spoke up.
"Thank you. It's some big boots to fill and I'll try my best to fill them. That said, I'm not my father. I don't have his experience and only got some of his intuition passed down. I'll probably be making a few slip-ups here and there, and if I do, I want everyone to know that it's all right to let me know when I'm screwing up. Better if it gets course-corrected early than to have everything go Fubar at the last moment. I won't always enact your suggestions, I can't promise that, but I do at least promise to hear you out. Now, that that's out of the way, why don't we start with introductions? I'll start. I'm Jozef Poniatowski, your new Boss. I was raised on Butte Hold and Graduated top of my class from the Blackjack School of Combat recently. I enjoy a good drink, dueling with blades, strategy, and gambling. I hate when people shit-talk me behind my back or talk about me like I'm not in the room." I nodded.
"Serena Gomez, Captain of the Cardenia Claremont and de facto commander of our Aerospace Forces. I was born and raised on Cerillos and enjoy piloting, fast hovercars, and poker. I have a limited amount of patience for fools and I don't take shit from anyone." Introduced Captain Gomez, nodding at Doctor Acker.
"Doctor Allison Acker, Ph.D. in History, Engineering, Archeology, and Computer Science from Tharkad University, with a specialty in reverse engineering. I was born and raised on Alexandria in the Virginia Shire of the Federation of Skye in the Lyran Commonwealth. I enjoy Tacos, Puzzles, and Trivia. I hate smug people and can't stand shrimp." Offered up, Doctor Acker. The Blonde in the Flight Suit went next.
"Helena 'Chief' Katsopolos, I'm in charge of our Aerospace Fighter Group. Flight Academy of Thorin Class of thirty-fourteen. Spent four years in the LCAF as a Stingray Jock and did pretty well for myself, mostly on frontier duty against pirates except for a single combat tour against the Dracs over Harvest. I like competition, a good drink, and cigars. I hate pirates and anyone who talks big but can't back it up." Offered Helena Katsoupolos.
"Speaking of Rasalhague, that is where I come in. I'm Captain Boleslaw Jankowski, your Chief of Security. I was born and raised on Predlitz like your family was in the old days. I spent a decade causing trouble for the Warlord of Rasalhague, letting it be known that we would not take Drac Tyrrany lying down. Then I spent another six years as a Mercenary Operator after that before your father snapped me up this past year. I enjoy strategy, fighting, and good Krupnik. I hate the Draconis Combine's rule of Rasalhague, they're little better than Bandits the way they go about it." Nodded the Grizzled Veteran.
"I suppose that leaves me for last, then. I'm Barton Matthews, born and raised on New Avalon. My father ran a large company that had its fingers in many pies. It was successful enough for him to send me to law school. Matthews Industries made money hand over fist right up until it was bought out by the First Prince and nationalized a few years back. I enjoy a nice pint, the theater, and the odd cool hat. I don't hate much but for two people, Simeon DeVries and Raymond Prentiss, two total fucking twats who I hope to never fucking see again." Huffed the Heavyset Bearded Man.
"Right, well. I suppose that leaves business then." I nodded.
"Wait until after I serve the Escarole Soup." Nodded the Chef, placing a number of bowls out onto the table before bringing the pot over to ladle out a generous helping of soup into each bowl. I tasted mine and it was damn good, I said as much and got no arguments from the Senior Staff.
"Chef Matassa uses leftovers to prep stock every morning and has a couple of gallons of soup ready to go at any given time. Not only does it cut down on wasted foodstuffs, but it's damn good." Informed Captain Gomez.
"Yeah, could be a lot worse. Some of the slop I've had in the LCAF comes to mind." Agreed Helena Katsopolos.
"You think that's bad? You should try the mess food in some mercenary companies. If I ever eat another dinner of chipped beef on toast again, it'll be too soon." Scoffed Captain Jankowski.
"Yeah, Chef Matassa's the best. He knows how to make Carnitas Tacos New Abilene-style." Grinned Doctor Acker.
"Beats the pants off some of the stuff back on New Avalon. I swear, too many of my fellow New Avalonians are into odd-tasting curries for my liking." Confirmed Barton Matthews.
"Thank you, you're all too kind. A lot of this is just recipes I picked up traveling after I graduated Culinary School on Tybalt. This isn't my first, second, or even third stint as Head Chef on a Jumpship, you know." Grinned Chef Matassa.
We spent the next twenty minutes eating and by the time we were done, we could finally begin going over the relevant parts of catching me up to speed on what exactly happened on Epsilon Pegasus. Apparently, there'd been a decent amount of stuff they'd had to leave behind because of lack of Cargo Space. While there were a number of dropships in the orbital drydock, notably a trio of Excalibur-class and a pair of Pentagon-class Dropships, there were no Jumpships, only the partially built form of what looked like one of the old Essex II-class Destroyer of the Star League Era that we had no way to finish building without schematics.
The Orbital Drydock being functional was a surprise, but if I remembered the dreams I'd had on the subject correctly, he had maybe three years before ComStar's Explorer Corps would show up in the system, at which point, we could kiss having a secret shipyard in the Deep Periphery goodbye. It might be better to just strip all the machinery for transport back to Iron Land. If we could find schematics to finish the Destroyer, then that was all well and good, but a decision would have to be made on that within the next two years. Beyond that, there were a number of Explorer Mechs, Exploration Vehicles, and SLDF Vintage Equipment that hadn't been taken with them.
What had been taken had been several disassembled Storm Inhibitors, Water Purifiers, Air Filtration Systems, and Prototype ExplorerMechs and Exploration Vehicles, along with a single General Motors Nova-Five Ultra Autocannon, and several types of special autocannon munitions such as Armor Piercing, Flak, Incendiary, and Precision munitions. The main thing that had been taken from the base, however, was a pair of Partial Data Cores. There was some amount of Data Corruption on both cores, but what Data the team of Computer Techs was able to pull off of them cleanly was a potential goldmine of LosTech.
The first core had a wealth of information on Star League Era Terraforming Technology. Megastructures such as Soletta Arrays, which were large orbital networks of mirrors and solar sails that can be used to warm an icy planet for ease of habitation, dome colony schematics, geothermal stabilizers that could stabilize tectonic activity while also tapping a planet's molten core for power all had schematics on the core, though there were still a number of quick and dirty processes. The second core had nothing less than annotated star charts for every system known to the Star League, only some of the annotations had survived, however. The ones that did noted natural resources, populations, and placement of SLDF Bases if any. Notably, the Major SLDF Fortress dug into the Mountains of Erewhon. That was listed as a major command post on the charts, which likely meant it had any number of memory cores.
Of the equipment that hadn't been taken from the non-drydock part of Epsilon Pegasus, there were twenty Marco ExplorerMechs, forty Series N Exploration Vehicles, one lance of HGN-732b Royal Highlander Assault Mechs, one Squadron of SB-27b Royal Sabre Aerospace Fighters, a number of disassembled Arrow IV Artillery Systems with crates of alternate missile types including Cluster Arrow Missiles, Homing Missiles, Thunder Missiles, and Illumination Missiles. Finally, there were a number of spare parts and munitions for various mechs including a McArthur Anti-Missile System and several more crates of special autocannon munitions.
All told Epsilon Pegasi was quite possibly the biggest find that Past Prologue Ltd had prospected yet, and they were woefully unprepared to take advantage of it. They just didn't have the cargo capacity or the space lift. Fortunately, there was an easy solution. That was to leave the Claremont's Dropship compliment with me in the Iron Land system. We would prospect the Iron Land Cache while Captain Gomez took the Claremont back to Epsilon Pegasus. From there, she could use the trio of Excalibur-class Dropships sitting in the Drydock to transport things. That was eighteen thousand tons of lift capacity between the three Excalibur-class vessels.
Once they'd scooped everything up and brought it back to Iron Land, they could go back for the Pentagon-class Dropships. The prospecting would take a while, Epsilon Pegasus was a hundred-eighty-six light years from Iron Land, which meant eight days in interstellar transit and nine days to the Jump Point on either end meant that it would likely take twenty-six days to make the trip one way. I'd been lucky that they were already on their way to come pick me up from Blackjack because that was a hell of a ride. Still, it was what they had signed up for. It would take roughly four months for Past Prologue to scoop everything from Epsilon Pegasus, assuming we couldn't find schematics to finish the partially-built destroyer and decided to simply strip the drydock of manufacturing capability.
Still, it would be worth it. I was already planning other trips, to Camelot Command, to Fort Merrimack in the Erewhon Mountains, and to Star League Depot Six-oh-one on Rosetta. My priority had to be to start reverse-engineering technology that would help me conquer and develop the Coreward Periphery. To that end, I needed to know how long it would take to develop reverse-engineered technology.
"Doctor Acker, how long will it take the Technical Division to reverse engineer the CASE, Ultra Autocanon, and Special Munitions currently stowed on board?" I asked.
"The Special Autocanon Munitions shouldn't be a problem, give us a week or two and we can have schematics for the first of those ready to go. The Ultra Autocanon might take us as long as a month, with the CASE taking the same amount. Why?" Questioned Doctor Acker.
"And if I tasked you with using those newly developed technologies to develop an Ultra Autocanon specifically using CASE Ammo Storage and specifically for Special Autocanon Munitions?" I pressed.
"That's more of Bill's Department. Doctor Robbins specializes in technical design, though I do work closely with him quite a bit. I'd say it would take about four months from starting the first work to having a finished design for your Aultra Autocannon. Give or take a week or two." Answered Doctor Acker.
"That fast?" I queried.
"Your father had the money and the contacts to hire the best technicians in the Sphere. Of course, it would go a lot quicker if we could get an intact Memory Core from the Military Research Base in Iron Land. If we had something like that, we could cut the time in half." Nodded Doctor Acker.
"Good. I want to be able to begin producing Ultra Autocannon Designs for an upgrade of the Rifleman I'm designing before the year is over." I nodded.
"That sounds doable, if only just. You're going to have to retask some production away from medium or light mechs to do it though. Why go through all this trouble, though?" Questioned Barton Matthews.
"Simple. Redjack Ryan took something that didn't belong to him and I want it back." I responded.
"It sounds like you're planning to turn all your guns on Redjack Ryan and Butte Hold at some point. He's not gonna just surrender, you know?" Pointed out Helena Katsopolos.
"Then that will be a very painful lesson. For him." I intoned.
"Well if your mind is made up on that, I have to say, I'd hate to be that poor bastard." Chuckled Barton Matthews.
"You're gonna want to keep information from leaking out about any of our finds and projects then." Advised Captain Gomez.
"Can you handle that job, Captain Jankowski?" I queried.
"Does a bear shit in the woods? I can handle it easily." Nodded Jankowski.
"Good, then I think we're adjourning for the day. We have a plan for going forward and a rough timetable." I said.
"What are you going to do now?" Questioned Helena Katsopolos.
"I've been invited to a meeting of the Dropship captains. They want to sound out the new Boss." I informed.
Helena just grinned at that, and Captain Jankowski snickered. I got a confused look on my face before they deigned to explain it to me. The Dropship Captains had a weekly poker night every third duty shift of the week in the Captain's Lounge. Helena and Captain Jankowski had standing invites as did a senior member of the Technical Team, Doctor Harrison James. They'd just invited me to sit in on the game, likely looking to snatch a few extra C-Bills from the Boss in the bargain. I couldn't exactly fault them, plus, Poker was a pretty good way to get to know someone. I wouldn't find out until later that Captain Haesteinnsson of the Hoplon cheats every time he starts losing too much.
By the time I did, I would have already wound up a few hundred C-Bills lighter and a standing invitation to the game heavier. . .
XXXX
AN: OK, so we met the Senior Staff of Past Prologue Ltd, got a full inventory of the Epsilon Pegasus Cache, and leads on a few other big Caches in the vicinity. We also have a rough plan and timetable for short-term goals as regards this haul, as well as the first stated intention by Jozef to retake Butte Hold from Redjack Ryan. Notably, all of the mentioned SLDF Facilities are canon ones that should still have stuff around to be salvaged.
Star Charts with partial annotations really do help when it comes time to do LosTech prospecting, after all. Some of the annotations are missing, but at the very least there is a map of every system known to the Star League in Jozef's Possession, even if he doesn't know exactly what is waiting on a bunch of them due to missing annotations.
The mention of plans to colonize Last Chance and Botany Bay were parts of Jozef's Dad's expansion plans. Both of those worlds are frozen iceballs too prone to snowstorms for long-scale habitation outside of Dome Cities or Underground Warrens. It would be like living above the Arctic Circle for much of the planet's area outside of the equator. That isn't conducive to large-scale habitation and right now both planets are sitting at around twenty-thousand inhabitants. In canon, they'd send tribute to Maria Morgraine once she set up her Valkyriate, rather than get slaughtered by Pirates. With Storm Inhibitors, though, a lot of those problems can be solved.
At any rate, next up will be meeting the Dropship crews.
Stay tuned. . .
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