Veni, Vidi, (Re)aedificavi "I Came, I saw, I (Re)built" (A Commissioned Battletech Isekei)

[Baldrick the Wise]

After all, my secretary Susannah was really good at her job, and was attractive to boot. She'd managed to sweet talk the poor, young, and innocent MRB representative into giving her copies of the current contracts and payments that Hammer had taken.

Click to shrink...

So that's 31st century version of 13th century trope of seductress taking advantage of novice monk?

 

[MarkWarrior]

Chapter 23

Date: August 26, 3028

It was Rebecca's elbow in my ribs that woke me up. My lover's groaning at me doing more to rouse me from my deep slumber than the ringing phone did.

Grunting out that I would get it, I blearily opened my eyes and sat up, rubbing sleep and some eye boogers out of the corners before easing my feet over the side of the bed and standing up on the cold hardwood floor while stretching my arms out over my head.

Then, at least mostly awake, navigated the dark space of the bedroom to where the phone was ringing across from the bed next to a bookshelf. Closing my eyes, I leaned an elbow against the wall and grabbed the phone from its receiver before answering.

"Blaze, here," I muttered.

"Edmund," Sylvie's voice was far too awake and chipper for… I glanced at the clock. Four in the morning. "You need to turn on your Tri-Vid and look at the news, then I think we need to have an emergency meeting."

"Sylvie, it's four," I replied with a sigh, reaching a hand up to move a lock of hair out of my eyes. "Whatever this is, it can wait until morning."

"The Lyrans launched a full offensive against the Draconis Combine four days ago, and the Federated Suns did the same in the Capellan Confederation," Sylvie said, and I felt a cold shiver move down my spine.

"Wait," I was definitely awake now. "I thought all of the leaders were invited to that wedding on Terra."

"Yeah," I heard a laugh from Sylvie. "The First Prince's first gift to his new bride was the Capellan Confederation."

"Shit," I swore, turning around and leaning the back of my head against the wall. "If we're in a war footing again, then our enitre strategy for expansion just changed," I looked at the clock again. "See if you can get Eddie and Billy awake and ready to meet me at the factory. Give me thirty minutes to an hour, I'll throw something together and meet you guys there."

"I'll see if I can get the old men out of their beds," Sylvie replied. "See you in a couple of hours, Edmund."

The line went dead, leaving me with a dial tone and static before I set it back down on the cradle.

"What was that about?" Rebecca asked, any previous sleepiness replaced by curiosity.

"We're at war again," I replied, moving over to the light switch and looking askant at my lover before she nodded and I flipped the switch on. Of course, that simply left me distracted for a few seconds as I remembered just how gorgeous my girlfriend was. "I hate that we might be at risk here, but it's an opportunity to take advantage of, and I can't sit around waiting for the FWL To come to us."

"You need some help crunching numbers?" Rebecca moved out of the shared bed and began putting on a bra and some pantied before digging through the shared dresser for some casual clothes.

"If you think you can help, then I'll take all I can get," I replied, getting dressed in a pair of jeans and plain black shirt. "I'm going to the terminal, I've got to run some data collection, see if we can boost production anywhere. Then, I've got to figure out if there's some way we can leverage this into our negotiations with Skobel Mechworks."

"So, you're saying there's numbers involved," Rebecca grinned, finishing pulling on a tank top and a jacket before zipping it up. "Let me get my glasses. This should be fun!"

While she looked for her glasses and the hair ties I kept around the house, I padded on the soft carpeted floors to the basement where I'd put the computer that was tied directly into the factory's data core.

If the data was correct, by the end of the year, we'd have built fourteen 'mechs to sell to various entities. We'd just finished a negotiation with Hammer's Superior Hogs and promised them two of them. However, now we needed to see if we could put more out per year. That, and if I had the math right, Rebecca could check it for me. Then we could start working on project Phoenix, bringing it to fruition and cementing us as a second line and militia manufacturer.

Reaching over, I began printing out the budget readouts and grant money that we'd have available if things got approved as well as the future and present costs if we wanted to proceed with the expansions. I wanted Rebecca to go over everthing to see if I'd missed anything.

"Mmm, you know what turns me on," Rebecca teased, entering the room and pulling up the second chair before grabbing the printouts. "I might have to take a cold shower after this is over.." She winked at me before pulling her hair into a ponytail and beginning to pour over the numbers and information.

Meanwhile, I was looking at the factory pieces, using some of more refined pieces of my ability to see where I could streamline things. I'd hate to do it to my people, but if the demand was high enough, we could afford to start doing longer shifts and hiring new people so that we could run twenty-fours a day six days a week instead of the twelve-hour five days we were working now.

The question here really became what we did next. If we were able to fund our expansions now and rush completion, then it was possible that we'd also be able to take our Mackie line offline and convert to a full battlemech in a shorter timeframe.

Unfortunately, that ran into one of the problems of manufacturing. Speed, quality, or cheap; you don't get to have all three. Right now, we were producing quality goods that were fairly inexpensive and competetive with the market. We might be able to have our cake and eat it, too, but it was going to take a lot of work and a lot more manpower.

Thankfully, Rebecca was all too wiling to help me put together the numbers and figure out a handful of possibilities. Even better, she was going to help me present it to everyone else.

Siler's Salvage and Manufacturing was going to be shooting for the stars. My only hope was that we didn't burn out and explode.

---

"Well, we are a company that sells machines intended for war," Billy shrugged. "Taking advantage of the fact that the Free Worlds League is about to be purchasing more material makes sense to me."

"You said something about longer shifts, double pay, and stuff like that," Eddie tapped his copy of the sheets Rebecca and I had brought over from my house. "Can we afford to expand our personnel? Is it worth going through and hiring and training a bunch of newbies on this equipment?"

"If the grants and everything is approved, which I don't think they'd deny at this point," I leaned forward. "Then absolutely it's worth it. We can use our current factory to train them while boosting our production, then once the second line is up and running, we'll start shifting people over to said line in shifts until both are at full production."

"That's a lot more people to vet and train, and we basically already hit the skilled labor pool for the area," Billy sighed. "We're going to have to train people up from scratch."

"I know," I nodded. "But, it'll be worth it because we'll be doing things now so that it's easier on us for the future. Sure, it's going to absolutely suck in the short term. But in the long term, it'll not only even out, but it'll pay off in large dividends. Here, check page three, you'll see what Rebecca projected. Sure, that's not set in stone yet. Still, even if it's half that, it's way better than we expected for even five years from now. Expand now, plan for the future, and we'll have things settled and ready for better things."

"We're going to have to work on the bonuses if we want to start pushing production this hard," Eddie tapped his fingers along the table in thought. "And we'll have to pay more attention to quality control. Tired people make more mistakes."

"I know," I nodded. "But even if we have to discard a few more parts than normal, I think I have a way to make it work for us."

"Some units won't care that the part isn't as good as the one on the 'mech," Sylvie spoke up. "Selling spare parts that might not work is fine if we advertise it properly."

"Being blatent about them not passing our QC checks for mounting would be fine in my book, just so long as we make certain that it won't come back to bite us in the ass," I nodded and glanced down at my watch. "Shit, it's already nine. I've got that meeting with Skobel in half an hour."

"We'll keep working on this," Sylvie nodded at me with a grin. "If nothing else, it'll let you talk to Skobel in a way that tells them we're active in prepping for the future."

---

Skobel Mechworks hadn't built a new facility on Kalidasa yet. Not for battlemechs, at least. Instead, they'd focused on the Mackie plushies, different colors, different models, you name it, they were making the toy for it. Still, said toy factory that they'd bought out was the location they'd asked me to meet them at.

It was a power play. Even old, and without much in the way of sales outside of a handful of spare parts, Skobel dwarfed us as a company. And while they hadn't seemed upset at us reviving the Mackie when I'd spoken to their representative earlier this year, they also hadn't been very open with me at all. Simply stating that they didn't intend to sue.

So, I allowed the power play, dressed up in one of my suits, and headed over to the toy Mackie factory. Walking in, I nearly laughed out loud. They'd apparently been way more successful at making toys than I'd expected. There was a massive plush, one that made the giant teddy bears you sometimes saw back on Earth look tiny.

"I see you're taken with the limited edition plush," A warm, welcoming voice caused me to turn and see James Hitchcock.

"I am," I replied. "I wouldn't think you'd make one that big."

"Stuffed Mackie plushies has been an suprisingly lucrative deal," Hitchcock shrugged. "The board member who proposed the idea is currently heading up new factories in the Lyran Commonwealth, Federated Suns, and we've even managed to discuss opening a location in the Draconis Combine. (Though, we had to agree to make a Dragon plushie as well as the Mackie for that one.). It's not quite the sheer numbers you get from selling battlemechs, but it's a lot more than we expectd," the CFO of Skobel admittd. "Now, I've got a list of things to discuss with you. But I'd rather do it in the privacy of my office instead of out here."

"Lead the way," I gestured with my arm and the CFO began to head towards a side entrance with a stairwell that led underground and to a second floor with an elevayor.

"You see, we didn't just build a plushie factory," James admitted as we descended into the depths. "We're looking to expand back into battlemech manufacturing across the Inner Sphere. But despite our old reputation, we've been out of the game for so long that we need an onramp back onto the highway."

"And you want us to help?" I raised an eyebrow.

"Not for free," he laughed. "We know that you're a startup, and that we could just beat you over until you caved. That's not good for business. So, here's the plan," the elevator door opened into a hallway with a window that showed the familiar sight of an industrialmech factory.

"We're going to trade with you," James opened a door and led me into an office before taking a seat and gesturing for me to do the same. "I don't know how you managed to convince VLAR to overlook you using their fusion engines, but that's not what we're here for. You need the expertise to build new factories instead of just repurposing old ones. We have that capability. We're also willing to license some designs to you on the cheap for production. In exchange, you're going to get us access to the Free Worlds League Markets, and you're going to give us percentages of every Mackie and 'mech you sell for the next fifty years."

"At what rate?" I asked.

"You're giving us twenty percent," He replied.

"No," I shook my head. "We're expanding, and we could use your help, but I'm not giving you twenty percent of our profits off every 'mech design. You can have ten percent of every Mackie sold, and the same deal if we make any designs that were created by you. Anything else, you can leave alone."

"Fifteen percent," He countered.

"Twelve, and not a penny more," I replied. "We're not your cash cow, Hitchcock, if we do this, it's a limited partnership for two decades, not us being slavebound to you for the rest of my life"

"You've got spunk," James grinned. "Hopefully you'll keep that. I agree to the bargain, I'll have the lawyers and accountants draw up a deal by the end of the week. After all, with the 4th Succession War kicking off, we've got to get ahead of the game. War is always good for business when you're one of us."

He stood and extended a hand with that, and I stood and shook it, hoping inside that I'd made the right decision here.

 

[Radek]

This might end up being a mutually beneficial partnership, or a disaster. With the FWL, there really is no way to know how things shake up longer term.

 

[Tikitau]

This might end up being a mutually beneficial partnership, or a disaster. With the FWL, there really is no way to know how things shake up longer term.

Click to shrink...

Yes there is.

It's the Free Worlds League.

It will be a mutually beneficial disaster.

Afterwards, everyone will be vaguely confused at what the hell happened and somehow coming out ahead of where they were despite everything going all Anchorman.

('Wow. That escalated quickly! *beer*')

 

[Sogen]

Yes there is.

It's the Free Worlds League.

It will be a mutually beneficial disaster.

Afterwards, everyone will be vaguely confused at what the hell happened and somehow coming out ahead of where they were despite everything going all Anchorman.

('Wow. That escalated quickly! *beer*')

Click to shrink...

Well, right up until the house of cards tumbles. Remember; the worst enemy of a Marik, is a Marik, but Glory to Marik!