Chapter 27
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MarkWarrior
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Chapter 27
Date: July 4, 3000
Location: Mavegh, Abandoned World (Previously Taurian Concordat)
"Remind me of the reason we're out here chasing ghost tales, again, John" A man in a jumpsuit said, his Hovercraft trailing behind the modified Locust the pair of Lostech prospectors had modified.
"There's a rumor that before the 1562nd SLDF Brigade left behind a base before they moved on in twenty-seven sixty-five, Luke" the Locust pilot replied. "We talked about this before we got here."
"I know that," John sighed. "I was just hoping that we might have something more on this than a rumor."
"Well, we've got the journal of one of the deserters who joined the Concordat," Luke's Locust slowed to a crawl in the canyon. "Hold up a sec, I've got something on magscan."
"Luke, you're imagining things," John tapped his own sensors and shook his head. "There's nothing here."
"No, there's definitely something," the modified Locust raised the hands they'd stolen off of a Stinger and tapped them against the massive wall of stone beside them. "Switch over to the advanced sensors, I want to see if there's anything back here."
John sighed and set the hovercraft to stay in the same place while he got out of his chair and headed back into the cargo bay where a small fusion generator and a heavily modified Star League sensor suite waited.
First, John made sure the fuel was good, then he checked the connections between the sensor suite and the hovercraft's computers before starting up the generator.
"Alright," John told his brother. "Sensor suite's on, I'm checking your insanity now."
"I'm telling you there's something here," Luke's hands moved across the stone surface. "I can feel it."
"And I'm telling you there's noth-, wait," John interrupted his own counter argument. "I'm seeing something. Ground penetrating radar's showing something that looks like a conduit. It's not running to the cliff you're feeling up. I'm going to share my feeds."
With a tap of his controls, John synched his hovercraft's sensors with that of his brother's Locust and they began following the power conduit until they reached something that looked like a rock out in the middle of the desert.
"Conduit stops here," John said. "I'm leaving the sensors on, let's see what's hiding around here."
John was the first out of his ride, the Hovercraft resting on the ground now that the air cushion had been shut down and the main engine turned off. Luke took a bit longer, the frankenmech they used was a bit of a gangly thing, and climbing down a story via ladder took a bit of time.
"Say it," Luke said as he dropped the last meter or so to the dusty ground.
"You were right," John sighed as they neared the large boulder that didn't stand out much from everything around it. "There's something here."
"Question is, how do we get into it without triggering whatever self-destruct the 1562nd might have set up," Luke mused, stroking his chin.
"We should probably take a closer look at the boulder first," John said, grabbing the ballcap hat out of his back pocket and pulling it down over his head to shield his eyes and face from the light and heat of the local star. "Just because there's some sort of conduit running through to there doesn't mean that the access point is here. Remember what we found when we went through Fort Churchill?"
"Yeah," Luke sighed, staring at the duo's surroundings as they both wandered through the sand to the boulder that towered over them. "I'm really hoping this one isn't a dead end."
"You mean like most of our prospecting jobs are?" John laughed. The two had made enough money over the years to fix up the hovercraft and modify their old Locust. There could bae a lot of money in prospecting, but it really boiled down to being lucky. If you didn't manage to find a cache with a 'mech, if you only found a bit of ferro fibrous, or some old SLDF uniforms, you weren't making much more than enough to cover your fuel and other expenses.
There was always the hope that eventually they would stumble across the find of the century, that they'd be the ones to strike it rich like the gold and oil prospectors of eras long passed.
"John, can you check your sensors again?" Luke stopped in the sand and knelt down. "I don't think that the boulder is what we're supposed to be looking at."
"Fine," John pulled himself back up into the hovercraft and stood in front of the sensor suite's screen. For all of their failures, the sensors they'd placed in the back of their hovercraft were the brother's pride and joy. One of their first Lostech finds had been the shattered remnants of a Mongoose. The Beagle Active Probe was one of the few things htat were intact, and they'd pulled it out and began modifying it to work more within their scope of work.
"Luke, I'm adding the GPR," John said into his radio as he primed the device to send the waves down into the ground below. "I'll give you an update on what it says in a minute."
"Nevermind," Luke commented. "Grab the readings anyway, but I think I've got something."
By the time John had printed out the readings, shut everything down, and moved out of the door to join his brother, the other man had a shovel in hand and was digging straight down.
"I'm pretty sure this isn't a power conduit," Luke said, digging into the dirt and flinging it off to the side. "I'll probably want to confirm with the GPR, but even without it, we're going to want to see what this is."
–
–
Two days later…
The two brothers had dug out a massive hole in front of what they suspected to be a door or a tunnel that probably went deeper into the ground. Seeing as their GPR simply stopped right at where the metal was, they'd just dug out as much as they could. Luke had used the modified Locust to assist after they'd figured out that it went deeper than expected, and had done more than just dig a hole.
After all, they didn't want the entirety of their hole collapsing in on them in the event of soemthing going wrong, so they'd dug a ramp down, and gently sloped up as they finally reached what looked like a light 'mech sized set of doors with the markings of the 1562nd Brigade and an SLDF logo engraved into part of it.
"Weren't the 1562nd supposed to be a counterterrorosim unit?" Luke asked, wiping sweat off of his face with the bottom of his shirt as the brothers looked at the door. "They were only here for a year, when did they find the time to do this?"
"No idea," John gulped down a bottle of water before tossing it out of the hole and onto the surface. "Power on the door's fried, if we want in, we'll have to bypass it."
"Explosives are right out," Luke sighed. "You think the laser'd be able to get through?"
"It'll take a few days," John frowned, running the math in his head. "But if you can get through the crack and the locks on the other side, it's possible."
"I'll grab it and start working on it," Luke offered. Their Locust had a trio of mining lasers that could be overpowered to strike at enemies if needed, but for this purpose, would have to be enough. They didn't need a sudden burst of energy that wouldn't actually do anything, they needed the laser to be a steady, cutting beam.
So, John cleared their gear out of the hole and waited for John to jump down in via the Locust. If his brother was going to be able to sit around in the shade, so was he.
Date: July 7, 3000
Location: New Vandenburg, Taurian Concordat
While New Vandenburg's Industrial City was still being checked thoroughly for pockets of radiation, and the soil from said spots being dug up and transported into the void before the construction crews brought new soil in and started rebuilding everything.
Colonel McCarthy was ignoring the reconstruction at the moment. Yes, his homeworld had been hit with a sucker-punch, but he couldn't aid in the cleanup and rebuilding. Instead, he was focused on the more immediate problem he was facing with the rapid expansion of the Taurian Defence Force, Logistics.
The Concordat had more than enough people joining up to fill out all of the extra slots for the expansion. What they were running into was the trainers and the gear to outfit them with. The infantry had been the easiest part to get issued full kit when a lot of people had been reactivated or volunteered to be reactivated and rejoin the TDF.
There just weren't enough 'mechs and tanks to go around as of yet. Yes, there were shipments of what felt like fresh material every day, and the Protector had authorized the purchase of the entirety of the local production, but it wasn't enough, and it wasn't fast enough.
Food was easy, small arms were easy, it was figuring out everything else that seemed to be the primary issue that McCarthy was facing. For now, he had all of his people rotating through the simulators as much as possible while he and the rest of the command staff worked on the unit budget and how to get everyone equipped for the offensive that was supposed to take place in the next two years. The navy was already prepared, they'd been working on aerospace fighter production and refitting the ships purchased from the Kobolians over the last few years. Sure, it wasn't a lot more. But the TDF had been throwing money at that problem for longer than they'd been throwing it at their ground branches.
If they were going to be moving after the Navy to take worlds from the Capellans and hold them, then they were going to need more of everything. The Colonel just wished he knew where to find it.
Date:July 15, 3000
Location: Mavegh, abandoned world
"We're through!" John cheered as the mining laser broke through the last of the locking mechanisms.
"Fuck yes," Luke replied through the hovercraft's radio. "See if you can force the doors open, I'll get this baby powered up and we can move on in."
"I'm already prying the doors open," Luke could hear John's grin. "I think I can get them opened enough for both of us to squeeze through."
While John focused on that, Luke began cleaning up their campsite, throwing all of their gear haphazardly into the rear of the hovercraft before closing it behind him and powering up the small fusion engine the craft ran on.
Slowly spinning the craft around, he moved down the ramp the two brothers had built and waited impatiently behind the Locust. Eventually, after what felt like an eternity, the doors were forced open, and the duo stepped inside the dark corridors.
The hall was first illuminated by the Locust's spotlights, and then by the hovercraft. Brilliant beams piercing through the darkness and revealing that the corridor stretched along for the entire length of the valley.
"Why are all of them like this?" John asked his brother. "I get that the Star League were villains, but did they have to do the whole mad scientist thing with secret bases everywhere they went?"
"I guess they did," Luke muttered. "You'd think that it'd get old after a while. But it's starting to be a bit ridiculous."
After their chatter died down, the pair continued until they reached a point where the hallway opened up to what looked like a small command and control center. It certainly wasn't big enough to have commanded the entirety of the 1562nd, but it had probably been a center for one of the battalions.
Unfortunately for the two brothers, there wasn't anything but dust around, even the hangar that had probably stored the battalion's reserves was empty of everything except for a pair of medium lasers which the two had quickly stowed into their hovercraft.
"Alright," John muttered after strapping the last laser to the top of their hovercraft. "We should probably see if the generators to this place still work. There might be leads to another cache in the computers."
"I'll start prepping the reactor in the hovercraft for if they don't," Luke replied. "Lord knows that we'll probably have to route our own power into it anyway."
"Probably," John shrugged. "But it don't hurt none to check. Besides, we might get lucky."
"Way our luck usually runs," Luke muttered when his brother was out of earshot. "I hope not…"
Author's Note: This started receiving commissions again, so it's back in rotation. If anyone wants to check on the status of commissioned fics, there's a link to a spreadsheet on my Ko-Fi.
Date: July 4, 3000
Location: Mavegh, Abandoned World (Previously Taurian Concordat)
"Remind me of the reason we're out here chasing ghost tales, again, John" A man in a jumpsuit said, his Hovercraft trailing behind the modified Locust the pair of Lostech prospectors had modified.
"There's a rumor that before the 1562nd SLDF Brigade left behind a base before they moved on in twenty-seven sixty-five, Luke" the Locust pilot replied. "We talked about this before we got here."
"I know that," John sighed. "I was just hoping that we might have something more on this than a rumor."
"Well, we've got the journal of one of the deserters who joined the Concordat," Luke's Locust slowed to a crawl in the canyon. "Hold up a sec, I've got something on magscan."
"Luke, you're imagining things," John tapped his own sensors and shook his head. "There's nothing here."
"No, there's definitely something," the modified Locust raised the hands they'd stolen off of a Stinger and tapped them against the massive wall of stone beside them. "Switch over to the advanced sensors, I want to see if there's anything back here."
John sighed and set the hovercraft to stay in the same place while he got out of his chair and headed back into the cargo bay where a small fusion generator and a heavily modified Star League sensor suite waited.
First, John made sure the fuel was good, then he checked the connections between the sensor suite and the hovercraft's computers before starting up the generator.
"Alright," John told his brother. "Sensor suite's on, I'm checking your insanity now."
"I'm telling you there's something here," Luke's hands moved across the stone surface. "I can feel it."
"And I'm telling you there's noth-, wait," John interrupted his own counter argument. "I'm seeing something. Ground penetrating radar's showing something that looks like a conduit. It's not running to the cliff you're feeling up. I'm going to share my feeds."
With a tap of his controls, John synched his hovercraft's sensors with that of his brother's Locust and they began following the power conduit until they reached something that looked like a rock out in the middle of the desert.
"Conduit stops here," John said. "I'm leaving the sensors on, let's see what's hiding around here."
John was the first out of his ride, the Hovercraft resting on the ground now that the air cushion had been shut down and the main engine turned off. Luke took a bit longer, the frankenmech they used was a bit of a gangly thing, and climbing down a story via ladder took a bit of time.
"Say it," Luke said as he dropped the last meter or so to the dusty ground.
"You were right," John sighed as they neared the large boulder that didn't stand out much from everything around it. "There's something here."
"Question is, how do we get into it without triggering whatever self-destruct the 1562nd might have set up," Luke mused, stroking his chin.
"We should probably take a closer look at the boulder first," John said, grabbing the ballcap hat out of his back pocket and pulling it down over his head to shield his eyes and face from the light and heat of the local star. "Just because there's some sort of conduit running through to there doesn't mean that the access point is here. Remember what we found when we went through Fort Churchill?"
"Yeah," Luke sighed, staring at the duo's surroundings as they both wandered through the sand to the boulder that towered over them. "I'm really hoping this one isn't a dead end."
"You mean like most of our prospecting jobs are?" John laughed. The two had made enough money over the years to fix up the hovercraft and modify their old Locust. There could bae a lot of money in prospecting, but it really boiled down to being lucky. If you didn't manage to find a cache with a 'mech, if you only found a bit of ferro fibrous, or some old SLDF uniforms, you weren't making much more than enough to cover your fuel and other expenses.
There was always the hope that eventually they would stumble across the find of the century, that they'd be the ones to strike it rich like the gold and oil prospectors of eras long passed.
"John, can you check your sensors again?" Luke stopped in the sand and knelt down. "I don't think that the boulder is what we're supposed to be looking at."
"Fine," John pulled himself back up into the hovercraft and stood in front of the sensor suite's screen. For all of their failures, the sensors they'd placed in the back of their hovercraft were the brother's pride and joy. One of their first Lostech finds had been the shattered remnants of a Mongoose. The Beagle Active Probe was one of the few things htat were intact, and they'd pulled it out and began modifying it to work more within their scope of work.
"Luke, I'm adding the GPR," John said into his radio as he primed the device to send the waves down into the ground below. "I'll give you an update on what it says in a minute."
"Nevermind," Luke commented. "Grab the readings anyway, but I think I've got something."
By the time John had printed out the readings, shut everything down, and moved out of the door to join his brother, the other man had a shovel in hand and was digging straight down.
"I'm pretty sure this isn't a power conduit," Luke said, digging into the dirt and flinging it off to the side. "I'll probably want to confirm with the GPR, but even without it, we're going to want to see what this is."
–
–
Two days later…
The two brothers had dug out a massive hole in front of what they suspected to be a door or a tunnel that probably went deeper into the ground. Seeing as their GPR simply stopped right at where the metal was, they'd just dug out as much as they could. Luke had used the modified Locust to assist after they'd figured out that it went deeper than expected, and had done more than just dig a hole.
After all, they didn't want the entirety of their hole collapsing in on them in the event of soemthing going wrong, so they'd dug a ramp down, and gently sloped up as they finally reached what looked like a light 'mech sized set of doors with the markings of the 1562nd Brigade and an SLDF logo engraved into part of it.
"Weren't the 1562nd supposed to be a counterterrorosim unit?" Luke asked, wiping sweat off of his face with the bottom of his shirt as the brothers looked at the door. "They were only here for a year, when did they find the time to do this?"
"No idea," John gulped down a bottle of water before tossing it out of the hole and onto the surface. "Power on the door's fried, if we want in, we'll have to bypass it."
"Explosives are right out," Luke sighed. "You think the laser'd be able to get through?"
"It'll take a few days," John frowned, running the math in his head. "But if you can get through the crack and the locks on the other side, it's possible."
"I'll grab it and start working on it," Luke offered. Their Locust had a trio of mining lasers that could be overpowered to strike at enemies if needed, but for this purpose, would have to be enough. They didn't need a sudden burst of energy that wouldn't actually do anything, they needed the laser to be a steady, cutting beam.
So, John cleared their gear out of the hole and waited for John to jump down in via the Locust. If his brother was going to be able to sit around in the shade, so was he.
Date: July 7, 3000
Location: New Vandenburg, Taurian Concordat
While New Vandenburg's Industrial City was still being checked thoroughly for pockets of radiation, and the soil from said spots being dug up and transported into the void before the construction crews brought new soil in and started rebuilding everything.
Colonel McCarthy was ignoring the reconstruction at the moment. Yes, his homeworld had been hit with a sucker-punch, but he couldn't aid in the cleanup and rebuilding. Instead, he was focused on the more immediate problem he was facing with the rapid expansion of the Taurian Defence Force, Logistics.
The Concordat had more than enough people joining up to fill out all of the extra slots for the expansion. What they were running into was the trainers and the gear to outfit them with. The infantry had been the easiest part to get issued full kit when a lot of people had been reactivated or volunteered to be reactivated and rejoin the TDF.
There just weren't enough 'mechs and tanks to go around as of yet. Yes, there were shipments of what felt like fresh material every day, and the Protector had authorized the purchase of the entirety of the local production, but it wasn't enough, and it wasn't fast enough.
Food was easy, small arms were easy, it was figuring out everything else that seemed to be the primary issue that McCarthy was facing. For now, he had all of his people rotating through the simulators as much as possible while he and the rest of the command staff worked on the unit budget and how to get everyone equipped for the offensive that was supposed to take place in the next two years. The navy was already prepared, they'd been working on aerospace fighter production and refitting the ships purchased from the Kobolians over the last few years. Sure, it wasn't a lot more. But the TDF had been throwing money at that problem for longer than they'd been throwing it at their ground branches.
If they were going to be moving after the Navy to take worlds from the Capellans and hold them, then they were going to need more of everything. The Colonel just wished he knew where to find it.
Date:July 15, 3000
Location: Mavegh, abandoned world
"We're through!" John cheered as the mining laser broke through the last of the locking mechanisms.
"Fuck yes," Luke replied through the hovercraft's radio. "See if you can force the doors open, I'll get this baby powered up and we can move on in."
"I'm already prying the doors open," Luke could hear John's grin. "I think I can get them opened enough for both of us to squeeze through."
While John focused on that, Luke began cleaning up their campsite, throwing all of their gear haphazardly into the rear of the hovercraft before closing it behind him and powering up the small fusion engine the craft ran on.
Slowly spinning the craft around, he moved down the ramp the two brothers had built and waited impatiently behind the Locust. Eventually, after what felt like an eternity, the doors were forced open, and the duo stepped inside the dark corridors.
The hall was first illuminated by the Locust's spotlights, and then by the hovercraft. Brilliant beams piercing through the darkness and revealing that the corridor stretched along for the entire length of the valley.
"Why are all of them like this?" John asked his brother. "I get that the Star League were villains, but did they have to do the whole mad scientist thing with secret bases everywhere they went?"
"I guess they did," Luke muttered. "You'd think that it'd get old after a while. But it's starting to be a bit ridiculous."
After their chatter died down, the pair continued until they reached a point where the hallway opened up to what looked like a small command and control center. It certainly wasn't big enough to have commanded the entirety of the 1562nd, but it had probably been a center for one of the battalions.
Unfortunately for the two brothers, there wasn't anything but dust around, even the hangar that had probably stored the battalion's reserves was empty of everything except for a pair of medium lasers which the two had quickly stowed into their hovercraft.
"Alright," John muttered after strapping the last laser to the top of their hovercraft. "We should probably see if the generators to this place still work. There might be leads to another cache in the computers."
"I'll start prepping the reactor in the hovercraft for if they don't," Luke replied. "Lord knows that we'll probably have to route our own power into it anyway."
"Probably," John shrugged. "But it don't hurt none to check. Besides, we might get lucky."
"Way our luck usually runs," Luke muttered when his brother was out of earshot. "I hope not…"
Author's Note: This started receiving commissions again, so it's back in rotation. If anyone wants to check on the status of commissioned fics, there's a link to a spreadsheet on my Ko-Fi.