Helmsfast and Surrounds
Helm, Free Worlds League
11th July, 3015
I'd spent another couple of days on Atreus, making sure everything would be in order for me to take possession of my landhold, as well as signing many a legal document both in relation to it and to further work with the Free Worlds League. Janos Marik had left Atreus to huge fanfare the day after I'd been summoned to meet him, to go preside over the trials of the traitors and the two Hussar Colonels had gone with him with orders being sent ahead to their units to head back to New Delos, this time as a garrison force – and to take the Dragoon prisoners with them.
My contract out on the border had been extended somewhat, both to cover the full ten years I'd be holding the landhold as a minimum and the area of responsibility – for now it just included up to the Lyran border, but as I was capable of delivering more troops it would increase almost all the way along the Periphery border down to Lahiti and Hednesford – practically down to Niops in interstellar terms. Again, it would continue to be garrison/cadre work, providing back up and acting as the opposing force for militia, provincial and federal forces in the area. I'd gotten my cheaper war material rates too – slightly below market, only slightly above what the League itself paid for the hardware. It even included permissions for some things that normally weren't for sale to mercenaries, but only for the ten years – after that I'd be back on my own terms for their purchase.
The recruitment permission was a bit tougher to get and in the end would basically require several stages to get through with each individual, including vetting by SAFE that the person was in fact not considered as a further risk of turning traitor to the League. I liked to think that the fact I wasn't planning on hanging around forever played a part, even if it wasn't a huge one considering it would be at least ten years before I left – those people would still be useful to the League and eventually they'd be on the other side of human space, far away and incapable of causing trouble anymore. When I'd sent word back to the unit on Matheran I'd informed them that I wanted them to work out who would be spending the next six months travelling around speaking to people, as well as figuring out how to transport anyone they managed to recruit to Helm. Especially if they were actually allowed to bring their equipment with them.
My message to my people still out on Merton was to thank them for their hard work and to tell them we had a permanent home for the next ten years and I'd be working to rotate to them there within the next six months. Keep up the hard work for now!
Our orders regarding Matheran were to hold there until I returned and then we were released to head to Helm, from there to return to our previous duties. By the time I would get there both the Hussar regiments would be gone and we'd be handing over to the reconstituted militia units – eventually the 11th Atrean Dragoons would return but for now they were still considered to be a shattered unit after surrendering to the rebels and the Wolf Dragoons earlier in the rebellion after some heavy fighting.
Finally, they'd thrown in terms for if I found the hidden SLDF cache on the planet as a just in case. One for one replacement of any Royal-grade equipment, three for one of other mechs, two for one of tanks or other vehicles and four for one of aerospace assets. Other equipment was to be assessed at the time, though I would be able to draw on it for replacement of my current lostech stores at a to-be-determined rate. I hadn't argued those at all, since I didn't want to give any impression I knew where the cache was. Idle curiosity and all that noise was the name of the game.
It took me thirty six days to get to back to Matheran. The ride down to the planet was pretty brutal, considering Theo pushed the engines to max for a fair bit of the burn, but it got us down quick. There was a fairly quick turn around on the ground, the handing over responsibilities having been taken care of by Jaye and Jessica while I was on approach and we were shortly off to our new home.
From Matheran to Semenyih and then to Nova Roma, where we detached the Bonnet along with Jaye, Samira, Leo and Pauu to act as the recruiters along with a smattering of others including Evangelos, the cargo carried on board spread amongst the other dropships. They took Fancy Free with them rather than catch whatever transport was available, the usual jumpship routes still being all messed up from the fighting though they were starting to normalise. The Breaks took the rest of us onwards, Asellus Borealis, Ariel, Bedeque and then Helm itself, forty five days later.
It had always been a colder planet, barely averaging thirty degrees Celsius around the equator, but it had managed to produce more than enough food the feed itself with enough left over for export, as well as produce enough other goods and resources to be self-sufficient. It had even produced the Gallant urban assault tank for both the SLDF and the League many years ago, until it fell out of favour after the Reunification War and became a reservist tank until Helm was destroyed early in the First Succession War.
Being tac-nuked for refusing to hand over the Star League's toys hadn't helped things at all. It hadn't quite been a carpet bombing of the whole planet but the majority of the population centres had been destroyed along with vast swathes of farmland. Luckily the bombs hadn't been particularly dirty and the atmosphere had remained stable. Over time the radiation levels dropped in the nuked areas and became reusable, the population slowly climbing back up even if it was nowhere near pre-Kurita-tantrum levels.
A couple of other units currently called the world home, lance-to-company sized units of varying degrees of skill and composition and considered to be pretty marginal, but no one currently held the big landhold of Helmsfast - most of them were on the other side of the planet, a fact which made me quietly happy. Because of the size of my unit I'd been given Helmsfast and a few of the surrounding landholds - which included several towns, almost wrapped around the capital and main spaceport of Helmdown and also included some of the last heavily-irradiated land on the planet; the ruined former capital of Freeport, which had been the main site of the SLDF Group Marik logistics base and the reason for the Dracs to throw the little hissy fit that almost made the world uninhabitable when they found it empty.
More importantly it also included the portions of the Nagayan Mountains range I needed access to so I could loot the cache hidden in the mega-engineering project that wanted to be a Castle Brian underneath them. I happened to agree with a few fanfic writers back in that other time and place – it wasn't meant to be a Castle Brian, Keeler had just managed to turn it into a facsimile of one at short notice, it didn't have any of the active or passive defences of one. It was meant to be a somewhatsecret facility though, hence why it was so well hidden – no one non-SLDF was supposed to know the sheer size of the facility, the public aspect had been the whole damming the Yehudan Sea and Vermillion River under there for the purpose of providing plentiful hydro-electric power and stopping the flooding of Freeport as a local goodwill project.
We were contacted when we reached orbit and directed to land at Helmsdown first for a short ceremony before taking possession of Helmsfast itself. And it was a short ceremony – about thirty minutes of being introduced to planetary notables, handed the traditional landholders items of office – including the memory chip that had the security programs that would get me into the cache without triggering the self-destruct that would drop it into the underground sea – and then released to go.
It was pretty late, both by the planetary clock and our ships cycles (I'd gotten our day/night cycles linked to Helm's for the trip there to speed up adjustment) so I got the majority of the crews to remain bunked down or take leave in town and took the Low-Brow on a short hop over to Helmsfast itself, sending a couple of my pilots ahead to do an overflight. They reported back that the landing zone at the fortress was clear, but that not many of our dropships would fit there – the Whole Lotta Metal was probably right out, it didn't look like the space was suitable for anything larger than a couple of Unions at the one time.
"Alright Dawson, here's the plan. We sweep everything tonight, make sure there aren't any lethal surprises waiting for us – which there wouldn't be, but let's use it as a training exercise – then settle in for the night. In-depth analysis of what we need to do to get everything up to scratch can wait until morning when we get everyone else up here, we'll just do enough so we can all bunk down tonight. Any issues you see?" While we were still on approach I grabbed Dawson to quickly go over what I wanted done for the evening at our new base.
"Shouldn't be a problem Boss. Where do you think we can put the others tomorrow when they get here?" He asked. "Also, any problems with me choosing the second best room for myself?"
I laughed. What a question, showing he had his priorities in the right place. "I couldn't tell you, my friend. You, Jessica, Jaye, you all earned it on New Delos, so did all your boys and girls. We'll have to see who is going to be remaining on planet the most to give it to permanently, but you can have it tonight for sure."
He grinned and nodded and then suddenly it was time to secure for the final landing approach. In a short period of time we were secured in our seats as we came down and then hustling back out of them to see our new home.
It stood on a short plateau above the surrounding area, a walled off compound with several large buildings and a ferrocrete landing pad capable of taking a few dropships simultaneously. I think it wasn't originally a fortress - it must have been someone importants' private residence or vacation home originally, not off-world important though because while it had that ferrocrete landing pad the building and walls were all made of more local equivalents, which hadn't quite stood up to the test of time and obviously either been later converted from whatever previous purpose they had served or been built for as military buildings. It was mostly intact but you could tell the majority of it was more than a few centuries old, having escaped the destruction from the Kurita raid largely unscathed somehow. Maintenance on it must have been spotty because there were some bad spots here and there in the ten metre wall surrounding it that didn't look like battle damage and along the walls of the barracks-looking buildings, but overall it looked in decent enough conditions.
The infantry spread out smoothly from the dropship, sweeping through every building in quick succession. The comm-net was full of nothing but "Building clear!" for fifteen minutes, then everyone gathered back at the Low-Brow.
"Alright people, get yourselves settled in and get some sleep! We've got a lot of work ahead of us, but welcome home!" There was a short cheer and everyone scattered, officers and Preceptors chivvying things along. The compound itself had enough space for everyone currently here, infantry and vehicle crews plus the techs, but that took it to almost fourth fifths capacity.
Some of the locals who acted as caretakers had obviously come through in the last few days because all the living spaces were fairly clean, the bedding was freshly made up and the power was up and running. There was even some food waiting in the kitchen and several of the private rooms, including the master suite. Which was pretty nice, bedroom, private office, public office and waiting room, ensuite bathroom and storage spaces – I'd be nice and comfortable whenever I was on world, at least.
The follow up inspection in the morning showed some other issues. We had garage space for a number of trucks and transports, as well as a company of vehicles, but there was only room in the Mech-bay we had here for a single lance and no room for aerospace fighters. The VTOL crews took their craft out for more overflights of the area, the Cobras carrying a number of jump troopers who scanned the horizon with the side doors open. The nearby town, Durandal, had a larger compound on its outskirts with barely a chain-link fence around it but much more space for landing dropships and a runway for launching aerodyne ones as well as aerospace fighters. I relayed that to the rest of the regiment, ordering them to land there for the time being – we could sort out who went where when they arrived and we got sorted out.
For now though I wanted to keep the VTOLs all up at the fortress, assigning all of them to the garage as well as to the mechbay for the over-flow – it would be a tight fit but they would all fit for the time being. Long term I was thinking of keeping the Rippers even when the rest of the VTOLs and infantry were off-world, it would allow a quick response force to get anywhere in their range fairly quickly. Mech-wise it would have to be either an air-defence lance or a fire-support one. The Gabrielcompany would remain deployed on board the Low-Browfor the time being, though they were out running ground level sweeps to back up our aerial recon efforts. Apparently the switchbacks on the road down the plateau were hellaciously hard for such a fast moving hovercraft, so I'd told them to be careful and we'd look at keeping them out of the plateau in the future.
Battlemechs I'd be keeping a company of heavies on world, probably all down at the secondary compound at the town. Hopefully I'd get a hold of another Union so they could redeploy elsewhere or go off world in the future, but they'd be my home guard for now. I'd load my newly salvaged Battlemechs onto the Lotta for them to take to Merton and then fill in the rest of that company from the restored ones my people had brought with them. And I had been right, those last three badly damaged ones had had to be broken down – I'd signed their owners current rides over to them as replacements ahead of schedule. For now that heavy company would be down below, though I would eventually move a lance from somewhere or other up there.
Whatever ASFs I was keeping on world would have to base out of the lower compound or over at the spaceport itself– unless I got a chance to reactivate the remains of the old SLDF naval base, the few remaining out-system asteroid bases. They were basically stop-over points for pilots on long range patrols, somewhere to land and sleep before continuing on.
Then came the vehicles. My salvaged mix of things would remain here and be used as training vehicles for future expansion, while all my others would remain with the Trail and Leo. I might keep some of the Marksmanthough, use them as trainers – I'd have to speak with the crews, see if any of them would be happy to stay behind. If they said yes I'd plan on having them split into thirds – a third here, a third on Merton and the last third remaining with the rest of the tanks. Except for the Chaparrals, those I'd be keeping here since it was looking more and more like we'd burn through our ammunition stocks for them within a couple more fights and have to see about either selling them or finally ripping out the Arrow-IVs. I'd have to look at expanding the whole force out some time, definitely get more Manticores – a full battalion worth of them would be nice. Otherwise it was what I could get a decent amount of for a decent price that wasn't going to bugger us logistically. I'd look at relocating some of my already owned Plantlifters over here as well for local transport runs as well, maybe finally get some Karnovs too for that purpose.
I have to explore militarised fuel cells instead of internal combustion engines. That would cut a whole chunk of the problem out, at least to a certain extent, while keeping costs down more than just keeping everything fusion-powered. They hadn't quite taken off and I couldn't figure out for the life of me why – since ICE-powered vehicles had to do weird things to deploy in anything other than earth-like atmospheres, fuel cells were superior for that though fusion powered was the best. I'd have to trace down the downfall that obviously existed, though I had come across mentions that some companies did offer it on request for their designs.
Finally, infantry. I'd continue to expand the manpower I had there as a whole, not as specific units. More base defence and MP type troops, some more marines, probably look at making a few fully mechanised units too and a replacement pool for all of them and the jump infantry. Potentially also look at getting some up to fully fledged special ops trooper status. Combat engineers were also a must – not just for using out and about but for building up infrastructure here on Helm to help make the people here happier that we had come down and joined them. I'd have to speak to Doctor Selah and Howie about getting the medical teams out and about, more heart and minds free clinic stuff, cross-training with the local medical establishment, whatever they could do.
Some loose plans in place I went down to Durandal and went through introductions down there. The townsfolk were warily friendly but warmed up a bit when I thanked who ever had been doing the maintenance up the plateau and said we'd be offering people jobs whenever and wherever we could, especially with regards to manpower for local upgrade projects. They didn't have a hospital per se, just an upsized clinic with an emergency ward, but the doctors and nurses there were happy to have the chance to work with my medics.
While I was schmoozing the locals the rest of the dropships landed at the compound, some of the kids oohing and aaahing as they flew overhead and settled down to the surface. Dawson was still up at the plateau making sure everything was settled in there so I sent one of the Gabriel drivers who had come to town with me to grab Jessica, Colmazio and Samuel – the respective Mech and Tank executive officers – as well as any other company level officers available and have them meet me at the lower compound offices to discuss exactly what I wanted them to do. Then I made my goodbyes to the crowd and headed that way myself.
"So, I've gathered you all here today to reveal the true identity of the kill-ack!" Jessica had chucked a paper notepad at me when I began to talk like a campy true-crime story voice-over actor and managed to blind-side me with it. It got a few chuckles from the others as I bent down to pick up the paper pad and slid it across the table back to her. "Right, since the fun police have spoken, how did you all find it last night?"
The response was generally good but cold. No one had any specific complaints. Janne and Robin reported on the Helmsdown night life, having led their pilots, mechwarriors and tech crews out on the town but apart from them the rest had remained on board their dropships. Joshua (by virtue of having come down earlier today with his company to secure the base down here) and I gave them a run down on the fortress as well as the surrounding areas, including the town and the base we were currently in.
"Basically, we won't all fit. Short term we could put everyone up, but we'd be packed in like sardines. Now, this isn't a bad thing because I'm planning on sending most of you back out to Merton as soon as Jaye and the others get back here with whoever they've recruited so we should be fine with temporary measures. Anybody have specific questions so far or should I just get my plan out of the way first and you lot weigh in?" When no one spoke up or raised their hand I got on with it.
Second Battlemech Company, the Flashman/Ostsol/Black Knight lances were the ones who would remain behind for the time being, along with the new tanks – a pair each of Vedettes, Goblins, Galleons, Harassers (technically three of these but one was a laser variant) as well as a Hunter, Skulker and J.Edgar which would be a combination of home defence and training company along with a third of the Marksman and the Chaparrals. Until the training cadre could join us for Merton I'd take a platoons worth of marines from the various ships here as base defence, sending all the jump infantry (minus the badly wounded) plus their supports (minus the Rippers and their crews) back there. Fourth Squadron, the Tomahawks, would be left here too – they were the most understrength having lost two birds and a pilot. There was a chance that the airframes we hadn't been able to salvage in time on New Delos would be found and Covaleski had promised to hold onto them for me if he located them while he was there until I could send someone to get them.
Either way they'd be left here for the time being, used for both planetary patrols and for scouting out the asteroid bases in the outer system.
"Last but not least, the mechs we grabbed from New Delos – the extra Stinger, the Valkyrie, the Wolverine and the Thunderbolt - will be sent on the Lotta back to Merton and be added to the spare Mechs back there. So, hopefully when they get there we should be standing up our fifth battlemech company, or close to it at least including the recruits that get picked up by the others. They can deploy from the Lotta until they rotate back here, unless Jaye wants them to swap out with Fourth on the Scrap." I pushed myself back from the table and stretched a little. "Questions?"
By order of rank Colmazio got to speak first after the few questioners sorted themselves out. "So do you want me to stay here with my company or are you leaving the decision up to Jaye? Can't be XO if I'm three months away from them."
"Honestly my friend I want you to take over Fifth Company and form the Second Battlemech Battalion. Whether you want to take your current ride, pick up your old one when you get back to Merton or take one of the new ones is up to you, though we will move people around a bit to replace you as Second Company leader and as First Battalion XO. Those exact decisions I'll leave up to you and Jaye, though, along with who you actually want as your XO." Honestly, it would likely be Robin for First Battalion XO, since he had been the other company commander I'd first recruited - only beaten out for XO in the first place because Colmazio was slightly more experienced and he didn't want it - but I don't know who would take over as the replacement for Second Company commander.
Cammi, the Ripper/Cyrano squadron leader was next. "So, is my whole company staying here or just part of it?" Damn, I hadn't thought of that. Cammi and Leilani, the Cobra company commander tended to share the responsibilities for their people since they always worked together.
"I suppose it would be smart not to split the team up. Barring something else coming up, they'll be added to the home guard. That suit?" She was nodding even before I finished talking.
"Can't say we'll be super happy being somewhere so cold though. How are we supposed to tan?"
I will just say for the record, she wasn't being serious despite asking in the best "society-girl" voice she could muster. The whole lot of ex-MAF women would sometimes play up the weird stereotypes about their home region just to make the more staid members of society blink. They were usually extremely professional but sometimes…
There were a few more generic questions about things on Helm, those ended up mostly being deferred until we'd had time to figure out what the answers was to them, but then we broke up the meeting and got to work.
Jessica wound up overriding me on one thing. Samira would remain behind with her bird in charge of the ASFs left behind. Remigio remained their squadron leader but Jessica seemed to think there'd be more pilots showing up to interview for spots and wanted her XO here to go through them when they arrived, rather than have to wait until one of them got back here. They'd switch off as things went, one of them always here the other out at the Periphery border.
We spent the next six weeks getting settled in and expanding the base facilities as best we could considering I'd ordered the engineering equipment we had – bulldozers, pipe and cable layers, diggers, concrete mixers and the like – left behind when we left Merton. The locals pitched in and got paid handsomely for it, especially the couple of construction firms which got us to fly them over from Helmsdown with their equipment so they didn't have to truck them the whole way. The split of those staying and going was organised and the meat and metal all swapped around. Etsuko had spent the majority of the time figuring out how to bring the majority of our support personnel here to their new home – she ended up contracting a Monarch passenger liner to do the run, which was pretty damn expensive since it had to come from somewhere in the Principality of Regulus, out to Merton and then back here before returning home – no cheap fare for interstellar taxi services, let me tell you.
That six week period ended when the Bonnet landed on the runway at the lower compound. It brought with it a double handful each of new mechwarriors, pilots and tankers as well as nearly fifty support staff, both technical and otherwise. Well, the majority of them came in an odd passenger liner, one that I didn't know the name of the type, but the leaders of the groups came on the Bonnet. It was also carrying the recovered airframes from New Delos, as well as a lance of Maxim APCs and a gift from both the Captain-General and the Duke of Oriente – a squadron of Stingray medium ASFs.
How the hell had Jessica known those were coming? She'd made that call a week before they were handed over on New Delos and none of them had sent word ahead.
Still, they were doled out to our new pilots and would act as an intact squadron of their own. The downed Corsairand Gotha were also loaded into their bays for the trip back to Merton, the techs already trying to figure out how much of them were actually repairable now they had hands on them. The two Tomahawks were wheeled into their hangar here and given similar treatment.
Most of the newcomers weren't actually rebels. Some of the tankers were, as well as several of the support staff, but the majority of them were just in search of a new home or adventure – a similar story to how I'd manage to snag several parts of my soldiers along the trip to Galatea.
The rebels were all reluctant ones, unwilling to fight their comrades they'd surrendered to loyalists forces at the soonest opportunity, surrenders that were largely quickly accepted because they hailed from militia units. This had made remaining home uncomfortable for them, some having faced accusations of cowardice from the families of their fellow militiamen who died fighting rather than surrender. They had good records apart from that, so we were putting our trust in them for the time being.
Only four of the mechwarrior recruits were rebels, pretty much the only ones from their unit to survive both the fighting and the treason trials. They were from the Eighteenth Marik Milita and had nowhere else to go – Dispossessed, their unit in disgrace and their reputations in tatters, they would have likely never gotten back into a mech cockpit if they hadn't approached Jaye on a wild hope. He'd taken them on and they were almost pathetically grateful for it. I told him to take them out to Merton with him – better they got away from the core of Marik space and spent time pirate hunting than sitting on Helm in garrison stewing. The rest were either individual Mercs or former FWL, about half of which had their own mechs – a nice little boost.
With their arrival it was time for the long trip to our patrol zone to begin. Colmazio's former second Miquel Parsell was now in charge of Second Company – and we'd need to start actually giving the companies and squadrons names, it was starting to get really unwieldy – with four new hires filling out the spots of those following their leader to his new command. Jessica and Jaye were officially named as being in command of my forces in the region while I remained with the home base and set out within a few days of their arrival, leaving me with a few new tankers as well as some VTOL pilots, a company of battlemechs, a short squadron of aerospace pilots and a platoon of marines who'd spend the next six months here as base defence. Everything else, soldiers and machines and dropships, was going.
Etsuko was remaining here with me for the time being, but in a month or two she'd be going to Galatea to join Evangelos there – he was departing on a random passerby, though he was transferring at Stewart for other connections to Galatea from there. And so by late August we were pretty much all alone here, getting all settled in and preparing for future arrivals.
Us being there was causing an uptick in traffic to the normally sleepy system from people curious to see if there were new opportunities for themselves, so I wasn't too concerned when a report came in of a new jumpship appearing at the zenith point that wasn't on the schedule, especially because it was an Invader with only two of its collars filled. I was slightly more surprised when an update to the report a day later that both of the dropships were heading our way, radioing ahead that the people on board wanted to meet me. I was still neck-deep in paperwork regarding getting work done, so I agreed and then forgot about it until they arrived on planet.
Thus there was a slight scramble to get things suitable for company, especially one that hadn't sent a detailed introduction ahead. I was in my office at the lower compound trying to get the last few things done when they arrived. There was only a few of them that got off of the dropship, so I left it to Etsuko to bring them from the waiting room upstairs to my office when they reached it.
And I almost fainted when I saw who it was. What the fuck were those two doing here and what the hell was it going to do to my plans?