WP3025 Chpt 28

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==Chapter 28 - Winged Praxis (Battletech 3015 CYOA)==
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===Reflecting on Youthful Hijinks===
Dropship Queen Anne, Zenith Point Transfer Burn
Fanardir System, Magistracy of Canopus
10th April, 3015
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"I still can't believe you didn't realize you were on open comms," crowed Socks. "Man, if you didn't have your Last Callsign, you would have gotten hung with something for sure after that performance. Commscheck, maybe?"
 
"Y'all had the chance to Name me Hotshot." I grumped, working my neck back and forth. I had woken up with a hellacious crick in it. I loved the Queen Anne for many reasons, but my cabin did not have the space the suite in the Hotel Batavia did. And with Terri insisting on sharing sleeping space with me lately, especially when Vixen was feeling frisky, it was rapidly becoming A Problem. I had considered moving back into the cabin on Siduri, but quite understandably, with me having exclusively used my cabin in the Queen Anne for so long, Bankhead had found a new customer to fill the berth.
I knew if I shared my complaints with Socks he would be spectacularly unsympathetic, which I could understand. If any of my fellow LMS cadets would've had the gall to complain about being the focus of affection of two beautiful women, I would have roundly mocked them.
 
Karma, it seemed, was determined to keep me aware of its presence. Or maybe it was the coño who had put me in this situation. Either way, I was alone in this.
 
"Yeah, I never did ask," he said. "What did that feel like?"
 
"Nearly getting my huevos cooked?" I chuckled. "Panic, mostly. Had something like a sunburn on my tender bits for a while. Coulda been a lot worse if I wasn't wearing the leather."
 
"How do you know what a sunburn down there feels like?"
 
I just stared at him. "What do you think?"
 
"Youthful bet?"
 
I shook my head. "I had to climb out a window when a ladyfriend's father made it home a little earlier than expected."
 
"So?"
 
"So Maria wasn't able to send my clothes out after me before Don Pedro came in for a heart to heart with his little girl." I gave a rueful smile. "It didn't seem prudent to remain under the window and get caught."
 
"So…"
 
"The hacienda wasn't exactly close to the kibbutz, if you catch my meaning. I ended up catching some morning sun."
 
"Ow."
 
"You have no idea." I shrugged. "Could have been worse, though. Don Pedro planted teddy bear cholla after that little escapade." A full-body shudder ran through me.
 
"Teddy bear?" he asked, confused.
 
"Trust me, it's evil stuff. That poor Cowboy…"
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===Catching Up with News===
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"Good morning sir," said Cliffhanger as we met on the catwalk above the fighter bays. We had stopped meeting in my cabin/office after the slight wrinkling of her nose at the inevitable smells it contained got a little too pronounced.
 
"Captain," I greeted her with a nod, watching Jai drill our new recruits in the empty fighter bay. "How are the new blood fitting in?"
 
"I'm optimistic," she said. "Lieutenant Saidu has them well in hand. I don't know that any of them will make ideal pilot candidates. Only one stands out to me, but if nothing else, we have a supply of astechs and something approaching a proper DropShip crew again."
 
"How about the repairs?"
 
She gave me a smile. "We were able to finish up the repairs on the PPC turret a few hours after you went to bed. We have a test firing scheduled today. If all goes well, the Queen Anne will be at full combat readiness."
 
"Well, that's excellent news. Shame we couldn't pick up a sixth fighter, but I suppose Jai having space for his drills makes up for it a bit."
 
She nodded. "The spares were certainly a good find, at the very least, and I'm happy that we got the supply of rockets."
 
"That was a good pick-up." It was always good to diversify what you could sling below the wings of your birds.
 
"They might be at a premium soon," she warned.
 
"What do you mean?" I asked, puzzled. Sure, rockets were a rarer form of ordnance than bombs, but it wasn't like they were hard to make.
 
She handed me her noteputer, with a video cued up on it. "We just got the latest Comstar drop. It appears someone in the loyalist forces got clever."
I watched as a Spider in Sixth Oriente Hussars colors jumped behind a Marik Militia Warhammer and vomited rockets from its overbuilt forearms, supplementing the fire with it's paired Aberdoveys. Something obviously found an ammo bin as the Warhammer erupted like a volcano. The blast staggered the light mech, shards of armor pinging off its torso glacis, but the pilot recovered and leapt away, even as a Shadow Hawk attempted to punish it with laser and autocannon fire.
 
The Spider pilot interposed a forearm to the laser beam, then sideslipped in the air, taking him out of the Shad's autocannon solution. A second later, the Spider was behind a hill and gone. The video stopped.
"I thought the Sixth had been destroyed on Calloway," I said, as I considered the implications.
"They were," confirmed Kumari. "This appears to be one of the survivors. They've been folded into the 2nd Fusiliers."
 
I nodded, mind racing. "Right." Rocket launchers weren't supposed to be a thing yet, outside of under aerospace wings! It wasn't till the Marians got the bright idea to use the single-shot systems as expedient replacements for high-tech missile systems sometime in the 3060s that they had been mounted on BattleMechs.
 
Or at least, that was how it was 'supposed' to be. Things were not how they were supposed to be. It was possible that someone had retooled a Spider line to make a nasty ambusher…but how the hell had they gotten enough armor onto the arms to take a medium laser hit without showing internals?
 
There was no way Comstar would be handing out the means to be making ferro and endo to free up weight for armor, and it wasn't a convenient cache of Royals that had been slipped to the loyalists. Royals wouldn't be caught dead with obsolete tech like rocket launchers. That shit predated the Hegemony. Besides, Comstar was backing Anton. It could be some sort of up-tonned Super Spider, like the Feddies would try as testbeds for their freezer program, but that didn't ring right at all. Not with the Sixth's paint…
 
"Well, however they pulled that trick, it seems to be pretty effective," I said. "Taking a Whammy in a Spider and getting away clean isn't shabby at all."
 
"Preliminary chatter says that the weapons and armor were built around the arms, taking advantage of the extra lifting capacity of the mech."
 
I raised an eyebrow. "That is clever. I wonder if we could do something similar to uparmor light fighters? Trade payload for applique armor?"
 
Kumari frowned. "There's similar talk of that being done with mechs. Apparently it's a major issue for balance. I have to assume that fighters would have it much worse. And that doesn't even get into aerodynamics for atmospheric work."
 
"We could probably improve the aerodynamics of some fighters," I pointed out wryly. "But I see your point. Not much point for light fighters to trade speed and maneuverability for armor, not with such a light armament."
 
"Or the ability to sling a bomb load," she confirmed. "We could try it, but I don't recommend it."
 
I shook my head. "Just spitballing, Cliffhanger." I looked back at Jai's drill. "How goes the rest of the war?"
 
"It doesn't, mostly," she said. "There's been some more raiding by Highlander units to keep the loyalist forces at a strategic standstill, and a couple of Dragoon formations are doing similar work, but for the most part things appear to be at a stalemate. That clip with the Fusiliers and the Militia was one of the few League on League fights that we're sure of, and we don't have a date for it."
 
I nodded in understanding. "What about Andurien?"
 
"No news on their movements," she said. "And I find that suspicious. There has been chatter on the mercenary channels that Humphreys is hiring whatever she can get her hands on. Apparently it's for territorial defense."
 
I scoffed. "And you can believe as much or as little of that as you like after our little run-in with Pinker."
 
"Indeed."
 
"What about the Sphere at large?" I asked, hands tightening on the railing.
 
"Liao appears to be biding their time," she said. "The have some conflict on their border with the Federated Suns, but the Feddies appear to be focusing on the Combine. Which seems like poor strategic thinking with the Capellans sending so many of the Highlanders over to Anton, but I'm sure they have a reason."
 
"Might be internal politics," I suggested, thinking of Hanse Davion and Michael Hasek-Davion's feud.
 
"Perhaps. The Combine is taking a more balanced approach, holding against the Suns while keeping forces ready to take advantage of mistakes by the Lyrans."
 
"Seems optimistic," I said.v
 
"The Combine has historically not had much room for defeatist thought," she pointed out. "And they have traditionally done quite well for themselves. The Archon's reforms are probably necessary steps in the right direction for her nation, but they are causing chaos at the moment, and the Dracs are capitalizing on that." She frowned. "We should be thankful, really. If she had more time to build the LCAF she wanted, it would be far harder to hold our Lyran border."
 
"No movement there?" I asked, hands relaxing a bit.
 
"Raiding, of course, but things seem quiet. I'm not sure how long that will last if the Captain-General finds a way to strip further troops from the border, but things are holding for now."
 
"Nothing new in the west," I mumbled to myself.
 
"Pardon, sir?"
 
"Nothing." I waved it off. "Send me the file on your possible prospect for pilot training and I'll sound them out."
 
"Will do, Colonel."
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===Guided Tour of the new Ride===
Jumpship Chaim Yosef David Azulai, Zenith Point
Fanardir System, Magistracy of Canopus
18th April, 3015
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Sadly, Cliffhanger's prospect hadn't been interested in joining the fighter complement. On the other hand, Spuds had taken to the role of helming Queen Anne with relish, something which delighted Socks. He had been ready to kiss the Taurian on the spot for taking the lion's share of that duty, a fact which had left her rather nonplussed.
 
I wondered if I should have brought him along as I floated in the airlock tube to the JumpShip, just to keep him out of trouble. But it wasn't like I could monitor him at all times, and he was an adult. He could give Spuds her space…
 
Maybe I needed to invest in a shock collar.
 
"What's got you frowning?" asked Diane as she floated next to me.
 
"Oh, just thinking about how Socks has got our helmswoman weirded out." I said, turning to my wife.
 
"If you want, I can ask Candy to have a friendly chat with him," she offered. She hung from a grab bar, the other hand resting lightly on the new cutlass I had gotten her a gift.
 
"Probably a better solution than the one I had in mind." I said.
Before she could ask, the door opened and revealed a woman in a civilian spacer's garb and a captain's tabs at her collar. "Welcome aboard," she said, initially addressing Vixen before reorienting towards me with an almost imperceptible motion. "I'm Captain Linda Oyagi. You must be, Colonel Adelman."
 
"Zalman," I corrected. "This is my wife, Captain Diane Zalman, our senior combat pilot."
 
"Force Commander." she said with a nod, offering the courtesy promotion. "Well, I imagine you'll want to look over the ship."
 
"We'd be happy to," I said. "So long as it won't interfere with jump operations. I don't want this to get in the way."
 
She gave me a strange look.
 
"What?" I asked.
 
"You just sounded a lot like your father." she said.
 
"Did you serve under him?" asked Vixen.
 
"He was the boss, yeah." she said, leading us into the ship. "I was the junior astrogator before everything went sideways and the crew that didn't get cooked decided to retire."
 
"That many of them retired?" I asked.
 
"It was pretty bad, Colonel. Everyone knows that lostech prospecting can go wrong, but rad poisoning is a hell of a way to go." She gestured to a heavily secured hatch. "Jump core access here."
 
I thought back to the message my father had recorded for me and nodded. "Fair enough."
 
"The generous pensions didn't hurt either," she said. "I considered it myself, but I wanted to be a JumpShip captain more."
 
"Did my father set up that nice of a retirement plan?" I asked.
 
"It was pretty good," she confirmed. "And the sisters opened up the coffers to compensate for how bad things got."
 
I got a sinking feeling, which was a trick in zero-G. "If so much of the crew retired, where'd you get replacements?"
 
"Bankhead Lines, some of the Landynski trading factors, mostly. There was some kerfuffle over me taking the big seat that Rebin smoothed over." she said. "Engineering is down that corridor."
 
Just perfect. I looked over to Vixen, who was frowning as well. I might have owned the jumper, but if I couldn't trust the crew…
 
"How do you feel about carting mercenaries around, Captain?" I asked.
 
"Cargo's cargo," she said. "I suppose it would mean less time seeing new sights, but more time with fresh supplies. I'm used to having the boss around too, so that's nothing new."
 
It was a perspective I probably should have expected from a jumper officer. Their status as inviolate could keep them at arm's length from things.
 
"Actually," she said, "I'll probably be safer carting mercs than doing prospecting or even cargo runs."
 
"Well, that's good. Do you still have the coordinates for the cache?"
 
She shook her head. "They were wiped so no one could get any bright ideas about retrieving things before you got here."
 
Well, that was a small favor at least. "Is the Sagan on Canopus?"
 
"She should be. She was originally scheduled to come out with us, but then we found out about you picking up Wiglaf and your Leopard. Had to do some docking collar shuffling in a hurry. Here's the grav deck. Careful."
 
Vixen and I managed the transfer to the ladders and the increasing gravity as we descended with the skill of people for who Gs were a variable concept, if not with the grace of a spacer like Linda.
 
"You saw the cache, right?" asked Diane. "What are we looking at picking up?"
"Well," said the Captain. "That thing was a Star Lord or I'm the last Cameron. Weird one, though. You've heard of the cargo containers, right?"
 
I nodded. "They were mentioned."
 
"Well, they're big. Like Behemoth cubage. They reminded me of primitive JumpShips, you know? Never seen anything like it before. No idea why you wouldn't just keep the collars clear for droppers, but there they were."
 
"What was in them?" asked Vixen.
 
"No idea. No one had got to them before the rads. I never went across myself. Couldn't tell you what's in the droppers, but I'm almost certain three of them were Fortresses. The last one was a Union, but it didn't have mech bay doors. Plenty of smaller hatches. Probably a converted fighter carrier."
 
My wife whistled. "If those are full, that's a lot of metal."
 
"Boss said they were. Full, I mean. Mechs, tanks, fighters."
 
My mind tallied the contents those droppers could hold. "That's a battalion of mechs, two squadrons of fighters, and probably another battalion of AFVs. Plus a short battalion of infantry?"
 
"And whatever's in those containers," pointed out Vixen. "That sounds a hell of a lot like a regiment, Duster."
 
"It surely does," I said. "This is going to be interesting." I turned to Linda. "How are Hida's hydroponic domes?"
 
"How do you know that nickname?" she asked.
 
"Schul thing," I said. "The garden domes?"
 
Apparently, I hadn't explained anything, but she moved on. "Dome one is working perfectly on automatics, knock on wood." She rapped the side of her head. "Dome two needs some caretaking, but it gives us the tastier produce. Never had so much as a hitch with the booms."
 
"That's good news. Do you have the bola system operational for droppers?" I asked, referring to the system that some JumpShips had to spin DropShips about for some gravity when waiting for the core to recharge.
 
"Yes," she said, "but it's finicky. It could use a refurbishment if we get the chance." Her tone told me that she didn't hold out much hope for it.
"I'll keep it in mind," I promised. And I meant it. The more gravity I could provide my troops, the better shape they would be in when they got to the fight. Still, yard time for a jumper was dear at the best of times…
 
A thump shook the deck beneath our feet. Linda looked up to the core we had climbed down from. "That'll be Wiglaf docking. As soon as Siduri docks, we can jump to Canopus."
 
"And then fifteen more days of flight until landfall," I said. "It's enough to make me say you should risk a pirate point."
 
"Sir…" she started, with a nervous look on her face.
 
I waved my hand. "I don't actually mean it, Captain. Nadir point, right?"
 
"Yes, Colonel."
 
"In which case, I think Vixen and I will take a look around the grav deck, if you don't mind, and let you get on with the business of running the ship."
 
"Of course," she said. "If you want, the old boss's cabin is still there. Has his name on the door and everything. And if you want, you can come up to the bridge for the jump."
 
"So long as we won't get in the way," I said. "Thank you."
 
With a few further pleasantries, she swarmed up a ladder and tucked herself into the zero-G core passage. I turned to Vixen. "Shall we?"
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The cabin had obviously not been left completely alone, but tidied up for the changes between spin and zero G. Still, many of my father's effects were there, including a pendant with a number of sayings in Hebrew inscribed in it. I slipped it over my head, feeling the cold silver warm with my body heat. Looking through his pictures, I found one of him and a much younger eema that made my heart jump back across the light years to wherever she was. I also found ones of him and the shiksa who had taken him from me…and with her children.
 
I didn't know how to feel about that. Numbness crept over my limbs, and I sat down hard on the bed, staring at a photo of him laughing with a woman I knew was now dead as they played with the young Contessa.
 
I couldn't tell you when Vixen slipped her arm around her shoulders, whispering comforting words into my ear as I sat transfixed by the photos, nor when she called Terri to join us, the two of them enveloping me in warmth and closeness as tears beaded in my eyes, growing into pools as the gravity slowly died.
 
I do know that we never made it to the bridge. Instead, in my weakness, I floated tormented by emotions I could not name. But as the universe opened and folded around me, I was supported by those who cared about me. In that moment of jump, I knew I was a very lucky man.
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===Meeting the Countess===
Thistledown Spaceport
City of Salonika, Canopus IV 
Magistracy of Canopus
3rd May, 3015
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"Very nice flying, Coyotes." I said into the comm as I started shutdown procedures on my Sabre.
As a final hurrah for our escort mission, we had flown a full five-ship vic all the way down from orbit, preceding our droppers, which had gotten into the spirit with a vic of their own with Queen Anne in the lead, Spuds guiding the civilian droppers in our wake. It must have been quite the sight from the Mindstar district, seeing us in parade formation all the way down from orbit.
 
"I call that a solid ending to a contract," I continued. "And deserving of drinks on my tab as soon as we can get things squared away." I unhooked my mask as the expected cheers came back through the comm. Raising the canopy, I was greeted by the noise and smell of a working spaceport, the distinct aroma of fusion-cooked ferrocrete. I unstrapped and unsocketed from the cooling fighter as I looked around.
 
It'd take some time for the ground crews to make their way out to us, so I popped the built-in ladder and climbed down with my small travel bag. Doffing my neurohelmet, I ran a hand through my hair and replaced the helmet with my hat and aviators, scanning the horizon.
 
"That was so cool!" squealed a young woman's voice before I was struck from behind by fifty or so kilograms of excited teen in an enthusiastic hug. "I'm so glad to finally meet you!"
 
I let out an oof and reflected that I was lucky that the direction she had struck me from and the body of my fighter had shielded me from the site of the other pilots. If they had seen, I would be getting razzed for lack of situational awareness for sure. Looking over my shoulder, I saw a coltish young woman with black hair clinging to my back, and an aggrieved large man who's every detail screamed overworked bodyguard running after her. "Contessa Landynski, I presume?" I asked, unable to resist it.
 
The girl looked up at me with an attempt at an angry pout that was more adorable than anything. "No, no. You call me Sahar, okay? I get so much of that, I don't need it from family too."
 
I blinked behind my aviators, not ready for that. "I'll try." I said, as the bodyguard finally caught up.
 
"Contessa," he puffed. "Please don't do that. Spaceports are dangerous, you shouldn't just go running across the tarmac. You could get hurt."
 
"I stayed outside the danger lines, Bill," she said, turning to the big man, unconcerned in the way that only teenagers could be. "And you weren't moving fast enough." She turned back to me. "Anyway, you're finally here! I've been waiting for so long for Auntie Phillipa to bring you! Let's go, let's go! Where's the car, Bill?"
 
Bill shared a look with me over the Contessa's head. "I've got to take care of a few things first," I said delicately. "MRB paperwork and all that. I'm sure that'll give time for the car to be brought around, and for Ms. Kasparova to join us."
 
"Oh fine, just don't take too long. I've got so many questions I want to ask you."
 
"Quick as I can." I promised, freeing my noteputer from its kneeboard pouch and firing off quick messages to my people. Whatever I had been expecting, it hadn't been this.
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*; Words from the Author : We've finally made it to Canopus IV! I'm certain some of you thought the day would never come. I know when I cross checked Canopus IV's time to jump point, the Gideon in my head swore at the final 15 day transfer time. But yes, we're here, and there's a lot going on in the chapter. We've got the first appearance of one of Gideon's jumpers, along with fuckery from his extended family. We've got updates on the Marik Civil War, the overall state of the Inner Sphere, and the first appearance of a Bolt-On Weapon System. We've got relationship drama, tales of youthful indiscretions, being overcome with emotions, and finding support in others. And we've got the first appearance of a young girl with a lot of power who'd probably be happier if she wasn't at the head of her House.
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