Nagayan Mountain Facility
Helm
16th January, 3021
"As you can see the facility itself is massive, stretching through several paths under a lot of the majority of the Nagayan Mountain Range, but the storage areas are much smaller – a secondary concern as far as we can tell. From what we've managed to gather the whole structure was originally a civil engineering concern, designed to divert the floodwaters of the Vermillion River from the Yehudan Sea, which would inundate the city of Freeport on a fairly regular basis – including the Star League Defence Force base and storage facilities there." I was walking through the echoing caverns with a small group of people, a larger ring of infantry surrounding us and several APCs shortly behind. I gestured down one of the branching corridors to point something out. "There are a number of entrances, that passage there in particular leading to one that opens to a plateau suitable for landing several larger dropships – we estimate as many as six Mammoths at one time."
This was the second tour I'd led through here so far this week. The first had included Duggan Marik as well as several high-ranking military officers and had primarily been taking them to the items still stored here. After several other groups and teams had done their own sweeps to prove that what I'd reported was actually reality, of course. This one included several Parliamentary representatives, as well as a few members of the Stewart family, eager to see the fabled cache for themselves.
To divert attention from the idea that I'd found this place and looted it for myself first I'd made a big production of having someone else from my unit find the Gatehouse and the Wall, then have us sit there staring at it for a week before I had a brainstorm and took the regalia chip and put it in the reader-slot, ala Grayson Carlyle. The cheer from the infantry company that had been loosely providing a security element had been quickly drowned out by the noise of the gate itself opening. I'd ordered that whatever body or hand-cams were available on planet was to be acquired and used to record what we found.
Costiniu, our liaison officer (who'd been promoted to Major in the interim years, what with the expansion of the unit), was one of the first group in. He'd agreed with me to hold off on making a report until we knew what we had to report, as well as the visual recordings to back it all up. He'd also been one of the most disappointed in what we had found, as well as the indications that someone had beaten us to it.
We hadn't been able to hide that a divisions worth of equipment had been in there, after all. We'd just managed to make it look like that someone else had sneakily removed the lot of it from the cache at some point or another in the interceding centuries.
"From records found inside the cache, there was originally three Star League Regimental Combat Teams worth of equipment stored here, a full divisions' worth of hardware split between Battlemechs, combat vehicles and infantry gear, as well as supporting elements such as artillery, engineering and aerospace assets. Unfortunately, as you may have heard, it looks like someone else discovered the secret sometime in the last few centuries and removed it on the sly – we're reasonably certain that the equipment was actually stored here, as the dates on the records post-date Kerensky's Exodus. Major Edwin Keeler, the Major of the engineering battalion left behind here had apparently worked on original project – or studied it at some point – and took it upon himself to conceal the contents of the Star League depot within it for when the Star League Defence Force returned." That particular lot of information had been stored separately from the Field Library core, so we'd left it to be discovered.
"So far all that's been recovered is spare parts, ammunition and a few examples of more advanced weaponry – a number of LBX-class autocannons, Arrow-IV missile artillery systems, extended range 8cm lasers and particle projection cannons as well as Artemis Fire Control Systems for various missiles systems – and a number of civilian disaster relief packs, atmosphere processors and water purifiers. There were even a stack of freezers, heat sinks twice as efficient as the standard model." A quickly diverted supply convoy had arrived over Helm within two weeks of us reporting the find, transporting all of the remaining high-tech stuff away as well as the majority of the spare parts, leaving behind the ammunition and the disaster supplies. "Barring something else buried under the remaining supplies, that's pretty much it. From here on out what happens with this facility is up to people like yourselves – the Free Worlds League government."
There had been some freaking out when we'd "discovered" the self-destruct system by the people inside at the time. Since then the system had been pored over by several different groups of experts who'd been rushed to examine it, none of whom could find a way to disarm it that didn't have a high risk of setting it off. Until that was done, the facility couldn't be used as a Castle Brian-style fortified base – if someone shot at the doors enough, it would drop the whole thing into the caged underground sea.
Removing the memory core hadn't gotten rid of it after all, just removed one of the triggering conditions.
The tour basically being finished, I left the crowd of VIPs to their own business after a brief farewell. Those that wanted to explore further could get their personal security to arrange escorts as required, but I had business back at Helmdown. After his initial tour, Duggan Marik had retreated back to the city and spent the rest of the week frantically messaging Atreus and his father with reports of the caches contents, as well as the fact that somehow someone had snuck in and looted it at some time as yet undetermined. I'd been politely questioned (and not so politely questioned, though they hadn't tried narco-interrogation) about how exactly we'd stumbled upon it and managed to enter without destroying it – especially after the discovery of the self-destruct system. Between the visual records I'd had my troops make and my own obvious disappointment at being beaten to the punch (I didn't realise I was that good an actor but apparently I was) it hadn't been too in-depth a questioning, then the interrogators – both SAFE and not – had moved on.
Duggan was sitting in the little office attached to his hotel suite in what was arguably the best hotel on Helm – arguable because none of them were really that great – waiting for me when I arrived, dropped off on the roof by Cammi in her Ripper. He hadn't appreciably changed in the five and a half years since I'd been brought before his father and the rest of his siblings when I'd be awarded Helm, but then I liked to think I'd only changed a little bit too. I was led into the room by a uniformed butler, who bowed to Duggan as I passed him then shut the door behind me.
"Colonel Karter, once again the Free Worlds League owes you a debt of gratitude. My family owes you a debt of gratitude." He leant forward in his chair and with a small grin winked at me. "Not as much of a debt if the rest of the hardware had been in there under the mountains, but still – a debt."
I managed a weak laugh. "Of course, Minister, of course. I wish as much as anyone that the rest of the materials had still been in place. An even larger feather in my hat, so to speak."
Duggan resumed a normal seating posture and gestured for me to sit down in a chair across the desk from him and began to speak again even as I sat down. "Your prior agreement about finding the cache didn't specify down to contents like what has been recovered so far, but the find has left my father in a good mood. He is willing to let you have first choice of materials retrieved up to certain amounts, with veto rights by him – through me – on said amounts you might take. So; what do you want?"
That did not at all sound like Janos Marik, the man who triggered the feud with Cranston Snord by being extremely tight-fisted and trying to take the Mechs and salvage the mercenaries had earned out from under them. The last bit sounded right, though. They might be feeling generous enough to let me have first pick, but they wouldn't want me to take all of it. Not like I'd be that stupid either, all things considered. Wouldn't do to undo the goodwill I'd earn so far and end up having to fight off a dedicated "company store" attempt to take my things.
"Well, that is uncommonly generous of you and your father, Minister. I had drawn up a wish-list of sorts, mainly hoping for a number of the extended range energy weapons as well as whatever spare parts I could use in my equipment up to whatever limit you would let me draw upon, as well as whatever I could have from the disaster relief supplies. A pretty conservative list in most respects, apart from the spares – those should let me keep a few of the more lostech systems running without having to downgrade for a while longer." I shrugged. Combat damage was starting to build up on my equipment, even if I hadn't suffered any serious losses. The spares wouldn't necessarily help re-bolt an arm onto a mech, but it might keep the gyro or computers inside going for a while.
"Forward the list and I'll see what we can do. From my understanding of your machines and the contents already taken off-world, we'll have to look at shipping them back here since we generally grabbed the items most likely to see this world hit with a raid. Though I'd like to see them try now." He smirked. Several different regiments had sent detachments here, both Federal and provincial, to try and secure for themselves some goodies, meaning we had about two regiments in total worth of troops on world, including my Home Defence Groups. "Was there anything else you might want, as a token of appreciation for your service?"
I think he was trying to lead me to ask for something, but I had no idea what. There wasn't anything in particular I did want from the League – apart from them not finding out I ripped them off a Warship and the actual cache contents – so I managed to demure. I thought he was going to bring up what he wanted to ask me for and rather than deal with whatever potential issue that could be I spoke up before he managed to.
"There is one small matter, Minister. I might have a line on another cache, though this one is significantly less promising." He sat back in his chair and shot me a questioning look, with the greatest of raised eyebrows. "If you will allow me to explain?"
He waved a hand inviting me to go and so I laid down the story I'd concocted with Jarrod and Maxie. The three of us being descended from a common ancestor, a Rim Worlds Republican officer, each one coming from one of the children the man had had in the lead up to the Amaris War. "Maxie is descended from the third son, who went in governmental service. He was dragged along into the Hegemony to help administrate the Amaris Empire, where he promptly sided with the anti-Amaris forces – our family long having had Rift Republican ties. Some of his journals still exist, included talking about how certain worlds had been more trouble than they were expecting due to the Hegemony having had the habit of dropping surplus war materials onto the militias in greater numbers there. Most of the worlds it wasn't too much of an issue – the locals themselves on-sold a lot of the surplus, only keeping the most recent stuff. However, I think I identified a world that didn't follow that pattern."
I stopped to let it sink in and he seemed to be following, interjecting with "I'm guessing it's a world that was rendered uninhabitable, seeing as how no one has come forward with this material before now?"
"Yes sir, it is. And even better, it's inside Free Worlds borders, so we don't have to sneak past anyone else to try and snag it from under them. Well, technically Comstar, but only because it's one of their semi-punishment worlds – the type of place they send screw-ups or overly ambitious types to think over what they've done. I've spoken with as many acolytes and adepts as I can about such places and as long as we offer them something in return and don't just go blowing the hell out of everything in the area searching, they would likely have no issue with us doing an exploratory dig. We'd just have to find the right Precentor to back the argument."
Duggan laughed and slapped the table with his palm. "Well well, Thomas and his little dream may just pay off a bit!"
I managed a slight grin. "If you say so. I think that will be the easy bit, the hard bit will be getting into where I think the militia cache is. Caddo City, on New Dallas."
His grin faded. "New Dallas, is it? From what I remember of the history books, New Dallas died after the terraforming failed during the First Succession War. Too much damage was taken by all the systems involved, first from the Republican forces orbital bombardments, then the tactical nukes against militia holdouts by our own soldiers when we came to take possession of the planet. Scavengers stripped the planet clean, there isn't anything left there but bones."
And they had indeed stripped the planet clean. What little had survived the Amaris Warships dropping rocks had been even more reduced by the FWLM regiments nuking the unexpectedly tough resistance of the New Dallas militia. But they had missed the boneyard bunker, part of the original New Dallas colony effort – the old underground domes that had been used pre-terraforming, long sealed under concrete and rock. The militia had used them to store the older materials, pretty much anything that pre-dated the Reunification War, I explained to Duggan.
"Hell, there could be things in there that date back to the Age of War. We're talking original Mackie variants, first-gen Wasps, Griffins and so on, likely similar era for non-battlemech units - no idea of what exactly is in there, but it is part of why I call it a less promising cache. Anything we'd pull out of there would have to undergo significant refurbishment before it would be fit for rear-line service, let alone front line." And of course the fruits of the Hegemony's intelligence efforts over the centuries leading up to the destruction of the HPG in Caddo City, the Hegemony Central Intelligence Directorate memory core - with every single war-machine they'd been able to steal the design specs for stored inside, including native Hegemony designs. As long as I could get access to that, I'd be happy even if they stiffed me on the rest.
"And how do you know it's still there? Wouldn't the 3rd Atrean Dragoons or 7th Marik Militia have found signs of the bunkers you say it's stored in?" Duggan had been tapping away at his terminal while I spoke, obviously having been looking things up in the records available.
I shook my head. "Not necessarily. Both units were surprised by the resistance they encountered and the New Dallas militia and ex-SLDF volunteers had already taken and used the more recent stocks of material available to them – both against the Free Worlds and Amaris before that – which would have been the easier to find stuff, leaving the older machines still hidden. The 3rd Atrean would have come closest to finding the hidden bunkers with the remaining older materials, but withdrew and then used tactical nukes on the resistance in Caddo City. Even when scavengers were coming there during the Second Succession War to finish picking over things that area was significantly radioactive – it should be clean enough now to be manageable."
Duggan made a noise of agreement with what I'd just said then went silent. He continued to tap away at his terminal almost absentmindedly, while I sat and waited for him to come to a decision. It didn't take long.
"From you bringing it to me rather than presenting it as a fait accompli down the line, I'm guessing you want to be involved but don't want the whole burden. Is that correct?" He asked me, moving on before I finished nodding. "Presuming you succeed in finding it, what would you want to keep from this endeavour?"
Hopefully this meant it was going to happen. Hopefully, I'd be involved and in charge. "A third of what we find, splits to be determined after everything is counted up. If part of the requirements imposed on the mission by Comstar is a portion of the retrieved goods, then a third of what's left after that's paid out." Hopefully, he'd accept that as my payment for bringing it to him.
"And what would you do with this potential windfall?"
Pre-prepared answer was a go. "I'd keep some of it for the unit, but the rest – if you remember my audience with your father, when he granted me Helm, that I plan to take the unit back to the Outworlds within the next decade? I'll use the rest of the retrieved material as a bribe to those who I upset when I left rather precipitously rather than have them take the unit out from under me." I chuckled. I'd send them as is on whatever I could find to transport them, then let them pay the bill for refitting them into working machines. "Just in case they still bear a grudge."
He chuckled along with me. "Finally, what support would you want from us?"
Now, that was a tough one. As little as possible, ideally, but not so little that they'd be suspicious of me trying to pull something. "Help with Comstar, so they don't object to us being on the world and letting it slip that we're cache hunting. For the search itself minimum help would be required, maybe a few specialists to help narrow down search parameters – any extras you or your father choose to send along would be welcomed. The main help would be when we find it, getting everything off world in the shortest amount of time – extra cargo dropships, potentially a Mammoth or two. Having them available in a nearby star system would be handy, so as not to tip anybody off we expect to find a large amount of material. I myself plan on only bring my Fury dropship and one of the Mules with extra equipment on board, with one of my Union carriers and their squadrons for overflight cover for the initial search. I'll bring up my other transport craft and any defenders when we find something, that way it won't be too much on planet at one time. Try more for security through obscurity until we're sure there is something worth securing."
Duggan made noises of agreement, leaning back in his chair and bringing his hands up in a thoughtful pose. We sat like that for a few minutes again while he considered the plan and deal I'd offered as well as what I got out of it, before he spoke finally.
"Barring my father deciding to go with something completely different, you have my agreement to start working on a plan to go ahead with it, using my authority to deal with Comstar. Any agreement you make with them will have to be ratified, of course, but for now I'll back whatever you manage to get them to agree to. Give me a couple of months to get back to Atreus and get this sorted from my end as well as get father's agreement but you'll get the support you need at a minimum."
I let out what was hopefully not too visibly a sigh of relief. New Dallas was always going to be the trickier of the two to secure without anybody else noticing, out of it and Helm, and doing it with official sanction meant it was both more and less secured. Yes it increased the chances of outside actors jumping on the search party but being able to bring it directly to the attention of a Marik cut down on those chances until we were in motion – less chance of a SAFE double-agent spilling the beans while the information worked up the chain – and it meant that I wouldn't have an angry Free Worlds task force asking me politely with a bunch of battlemechs what I was doing.
"Do you have any other leads on lostech caches buried away in those ancestors journals?" Duggan asked, oddly intent but vague with his gaze. I shook my head.
"There's mention in one journal of an experimental ship, but it doesn't go on to specify any other details on it beyond it was lost with all hands somewhere after an accident – the reports were in the Star League database he had access to but didn't have much information on it. Doesn't say where or when or even what exactly happened, just that it happened – hell, it doesn't even say what type of ship it was beyond having its own grav-deck, implying it is at least as large as a dropship."
He grunted in disappointment. "Well, if you ever find anything more I'm sure you are aware that we'll be more than happy to reward you for whatever it is. For now, dismissed. You'll hear from me shortly after my return to Atreus."
I stood and offered a bow in salute, before exiting the room. I made my way back to the rooftop before calling Calli back down to pick me up and return me to base.
New Dallas was a hostile environment, requiring sealed suits to work out in the open with in addition to extra radiation shielding so I'd have to take some marines for infantry screening rather than my base defence troopers or jump infantry. I wouldn't bother taking many vehicles, just a couple of Cobras for running things around, maybe one of the MASH ones to help keep an eye on everyone's health if we could fit some extra survival gear in there, though some of the Beagle scout tanks would probably help with their sensors. Battlemechs would be overkill until we knew where we needed to dig and what to defend. Mainly I'd have to take some of my engineering team to do the hard work of digging in once we'd found the bunker.
During the flight back to base I kept running through ideas on who and what, before deciding to see what I had available when the formal go ahead came. It wouldn't help if they had me delay for a few months and the unit I wrote up as being on the list went out to Merton and the patrol zone on its rotation in the interim.
In the end it took two months to get everything settled before I got given formal permission to do the work myself. We had several overseers involved, mainly to insure that we knew what we were talking about and were aware of the consequences of trying to rip off the Mariks, but they were useful in finding the cache itself – one of them spotted the collapsed entrance giving us the location to start digging.
While we were still in the planning phase Maxie rotated back and when I told him what was happening he asked to do something himself. Once we were alone in my office he started to outline his plan.
"I want the Argo." He tapped his fingers on the desk. "I want to go after it and when we get it fixed I want it to be mine. I'll take the Fancy Free, since we've got the LF-battery on it and aren't using it to shuttle gear to the Hangar Queen anymore, plus preferably one of the Fortress's and their people and one of the Leopard-CVs to provide air cover - that way when we get the thing back up off the ground we can attach the Leopard to the Argo and not need an extra collar for the trip back. Once we've got it secured I'll bring it back to either Helm or the Hangar Queen to get it repaired, depending on the condition of the ship and how public we decide to go with it, then we'll prepare another trip out there to get whatever is in Castle Nautilus and whatever else is out here, probably using the Queen itself."
"Okay, what's your cover for going out there? How are we selling you haring off on an adventure like that without tipping off every single intelligence agency that's been watching us since we "found" the Helm cache?" I had no problem with him going – in fact, I was very much in favour of one of us going out there and grabbing the Argo, screw the Marauders if they ever existed. It was more a case of I wanted to avoid going out there myself for the same reasoning I'd had for avoiding Columbus, there were way too many jumps involved. One of my fellows volunteering solved that problem nicely, though I figured it would have Jarrod of the two to be honest – he'd like the HBS game a lot more than Maxie had.
He had a cover story. And it was actually pretty good too, tying in with some of the others we'd built for having a good idea where the New Dallas boneyard was. Recently his father's heir, the new Countess, had sent him a message requesting he come to the homestead they used as the private retreat for the family on their home-world, saying that their father had left him another small bequeathment that they'd only just found in a small safe deposit box on the local bank. He was the only one who hadn't received this follow on endowment of his children, could he find the time to come by and pick it up or should she arrange to have it transported?
Hey presto, an excuse to start moving towards the Periphery – a little at least. Arrange taking the two dropships with him as going onwards from there towards the deployment zone out by the Periphery rim by a different route than normal, easy peasy. Then after picking up the new inheritance he'd send a coded message via HPG all but screaming in all caps "FOUND SOMETHING COOL, GOING TO LOOT IT MWAHAHAHA" and then disappear in a dead system somewhere after pointing the route firmly towards the Magistracy/Free Worlds/Periphery/Capellan border zone. Abuse the hell out of having a Lithium-Fusion battery to throw off pursuit or people extrapolating the path he was traveling when he had to jump in occupied systems. Meanwhile, I lower my head in shame and spread my hands in bewilderment – I have no idea what my subordinate is up to other than he found something that he thought he needed to get to right away. Eventually he gets to Alloway and then starts the search for Axylus, the moon that it crashed on all those centuries ago and then begin recovery operations after wiping out the pirates who'd been using it as a base before launching it back into space once again.
Now I just had to plan his chastisement for his return